A different version of what I’ve posted elsewhere, but I’ve recently bought, and now finished reading, my first Kindle book (bought on the iPod/iPhone Kindle app). I don’t know exactly why, but this feels more momentous than when I first purchased music from iTunes - I guess it’s something, but not completely, to do with the fact that I’ve been comfortable listening to music on my computer ever since I had an iSub (I miss that, that was a lot of fun!), but to read a book, well, it’s not until hand held portable devices have come along that I’ve felt able to read a book (on a ‘computer’). Prior to buying this book, I had read free Creative Commons versions of Blood, Sweat and Tea, and the sequel. Which is why I say it’s not just the reading of an electronic book that made this feel momentous; It’s something to do with buying it as well.
The book itself was good, but then I’ve liked Octavia Butler for a long time. Wasn’t that keen on the thought of a vampire book, but she did a good take on it. It’s a shame she’s not around to write the sequel.
It’s also a shame about all the typographical errors that seem to plague Kindle books (there’s even a Tumblr blog: Badly Done Kindle Books about it): Missing spaces; spaces where there shouldn’t be; spelling mistakes; hyphernations for line breaks, but now in the middle of the line. There aren’t loads, not enough to ruin the book, and no where near as bad as the formatting of the free ebooks I read, but more than I’d expect from a printed version. And a 2nd hand print version is a lot cheaper than a Kindle book, plus has no DRM.
