Wednesday, May 25, 2011

A whole crop of new eReaders!

Barnes & Noble just announced a new touch-screen e-ink Nook ereader with a Pearl screen for only $139. In an amazing coincidence, that's the same price as a wi-fi-only Kindle, unless you get the cheaper one with ads.  Ooops! I mean the one with special offers. -)

The new Nook looks pretty cool! And now they are claiming superior battery life over the Kindle. No mention of how it competes with Sony Reader Touch, who now has the dubious distinction of being almost $100 more expensive than the new Nook for what looks like the same features.

And then there's the Kobo touch screen  which Border will sell in the US for $129. It's like ereaders are coming out of the woodwork.

Personally, I'm not that enamored of touch screens in an ereader.  One of things I like about the Kindle is the one-handed reading, which, with the cat in my lap (see his photo in the right-hand column) is all I can manage.  I can hold the Kindle in my right hand and press the Next Page button with my thumb with no problem. That works while standing on the subway, too. I have used my husband's iPad to read, and while the color screen is fabulous for short term reading, I get tired of needing two hands to read.

But the best thing about new ereaders is it shows companies like Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Kobo are invested in digital reading.  Remember it's not printing that makes a book; it's the story that counts. And ereaders mean that reading is now more convenient, which will (hopefully) mean that people do it more often. 

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

I am now a GoodReads author

You can find my GoodReads page here. I have 162 books listed as read so far. Feel free to check them out and compare them to your own.

Monday, May 23, 2011

Great review of THE SIXTH DISCIPLINE!

Over on the Mental Geysers blog, blogger/editor Kae Cheatham posted a great review of The Sixth Discipline. Here's a quote:

"All the characters are sharply drawn and believable, from the dock-side workers who become Ran-Del's friends, to Ran-Del's grandmother who is unsure of the very modern Francesca. The final resolutions include Sansoussy rituals and political maneuvering in Shangri-la. Tension is high and the outcome satisfactory. A good read (great cover, too)"


Sunday, May 8, 2011

Some Kindle tips

If anyone out there has a Kindle (the actual device, as opposed to using the Kindle app on something like a PC or an iPad), the Dear Author blog is mostly about romance books, but because romance readers were ebook and ereader pioneers, it's also a good source of info on those topics. Today's post is a list of useful Kindle tips. There are more tips in the comments, too.

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Another guest blog post

This week I am featured on fantasy/chick lit author Mindy Klasky's blog. Her recurring feature (an illustration of how kind writers can be to each other) is called Inside Track, and this week it covers how I came to write The Sixth Discipline.

Mindy has featured a lot of interesting authors, and besides that, she always has something interesting to say!