Saturday, April 10, 2010

Commentary: On the Merits of eReaders

I have been interested in the various discussions of the eReaders that are out on the market now. Of course there is the Kindle and the Nook and I think about five or six others. I have not had any experience with any of them except Fictionwise's eBookwise.


My daughter had one of these and she alerted me to a sale some weeks after being on our summer holiday. It was quite a revelation that I could cart a whole shelf full of books with me and eliminate almost an entire suitcase, because far be it for me to travel without significant numbers of books. I had lugged some books along and my daughter had some in her luggage, so it was nice to have that extra resource since I read fast and tend to plow through stacks of books, especially when on vacation. At the same time I observed that said daughter was happily unencumbered with said stacks of books as she was happily reading away, both day and night, with her eBookwise. So I simply had to get one!


Thus, I acquired said gadget sometime last fall, and when I journeyed to the Midwest on a professional trip in February I was able to take about 40 books with me, all safely stashed in the handy little gadget. When I compared the price of this helpful little appliance with some of the more well-known and popular eReaders, I was quite impressed that I had been able to get something that is probably just as handy -- perhaps without some of the "bells and whistles" of the more expensive models -- for a considerable reduction in payout.


I don't see many mentions of this Fictionwise appliance, so I thought I would bring it to the attention of anyone who might be lurking around the ole Book Place. I have to again mention that I really haven't compared the various products out there -- I just know that my inexpensive and handy eBookwise gadget keeps me reading and I can take it with me just about anywhere because it has an extensive battery life and is easy to load. The purchase of the eBookwise Librarian annually ($15) seems minimal considering all the use I get out of it.


So this is just an FYI -- thought I would bring this handy little gadget to everyone's attention.


Happy reading . . .

2 comments:

Tracy said...

I really did love my ebookwise and think it's a wonderful device. So glad you're loving it as much as I did. :)

Holly said...

I have an eBookwise and love it. I recently upgraded to a nook, but it lacks many of the features I loved in the eBookwise.

The main reason to upgrade is converting/loading books. If it wasn't such a pain to load books onto the eBookwise, I probably never would have traded up. Though I will admit having the wireless download feature is convenient.

I still use my eBookwise, though. I think you made a great choice. :)