# The SBHonline Community Daily > Books, Movies, and TV >  >  Authors Feel Pinch in Age of E-Books - WSJ.com

## JEK

Authors Feel Pinch in Age of E-Books - WSJ.com

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## JEK

Interesting pricing on Follett's new book - Kindle more than hardcover.

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## andynap

Cost me nothing

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## JEK

Yipee.

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## amyb

Yes, the publishing industry is changing.

I will miss handing off a book I really enjoyed to a reader on a nearby beach lounge. I will miss placing a really good book on my library shelf. I will miss the kind of thrill I got today holding a First Edition of FALL OF GIANTS in my pudgy hands while regretting that I could not begin to read it until tomorrow because of evening plans tonight.

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## JEK

I had to do a great purge of all the hardbacks I had in my library. Even the local library doesn't want them anymore. With Mrs. JEK in two book groups, we were swimming in old books. The Kindle does help with killing trees.
This is her reading list from one of the groups.



2004-5

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

The Devil in the White City by Eric Larson

Atonement by Ian McEwan

Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Bernieres

The Awakening by Kate Chopin

Madame Bovary by  Gustav Flaubert

The All of It by Jeannette Haien

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

The Other Boleyn Girl by Phillippa Gregory

Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

My Antonia by Willa Cather (Nov)

Seabiscuit?
The Hours by Michael Cunningham?
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf?  (I can't remember if I read these myself or we did it in the group. . .)

2006

City of Fallen Angels by John Berendt (Jan)

The Tattoo Artist by Jill Ciment (Feb)

A Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion (Mar)

Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld (April)

Night by Elie Wiesel (May)

One Thousand White Women by Jim Fergus (June)

The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger (July)

*no meeting in August

Manhunt by James Swanson (Sept.)

Rise and Shine by Anna Quindlen (Oct.)

The Ghost at the Table by Suzanne Berne (Nov.)

Holiday Party/ no book (Dec.)

2007

I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts About Being a Woman by Nora Ephron (Jan)

The Glass Castle: A Memoir by Jeannette Walls (Feb.)

The Emperor's Children by Claire Messud (March)

The Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri (Apr.)

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen (May)

Digging to America by Anne Tyler (June)

?  (July) A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini?

no meeting- Aug.

Suite Francaise by Nemirovsky (Sept.)

Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards (Oct.)

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen (Nov.)

Holiday Party- Dec.

2008

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert (Jan.)

Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver (Feb.)

On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan (Mar.)

The Commoner by John Burnham Schwartz (Apr.)

The Gathering by Anne Enright (May)

The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O'Farrell (June)

Pieces of My Sister's Life by Elizabeth Joy Arnold (July)

August- NO MEETING

People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks (Sept.)

Sugar Queen by Sara Addison Allen (Oct.)

The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch (Nov.)

*no book- Holiday Party (Dec.)

2009

River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey by Candice Millard (Jan.)

Loving Frank by Nancy Horan (Feb)

One Minute to Midnight by Michael Dobbs (Mar)

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell (April)

Shadow Country by Peter Matthiessen (May)

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski (June)

Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl (I know we read this and I think it was a substitute for Edgar Sawtelle. . .) 

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (July)

*no meeting in August

Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett (September)

The Help by Kathryn Stockett (October)

The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown (November)

* party in December, no book 

2010

The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende (January)

Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10 by Marcus Luttrell and Patrick Robinson (February)

Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder (March)

Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson (April)

This is Where I Leave You by Jonathon Tropper (May) 

The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver (June)

Lit by Mary Karr (July)

no meeting in August

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne (September)

The Alchemist by Paul Cuelho  (October)

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## andynap

Amy- there will always be hard copy. I can't envision everyone buying some form of Kindle

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## amyb

My Rabbi once told me I was not doing much for new authors by handing off so many books. True, but I was making many new friends!

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## amyb

I just lifted 15 titles from these lists. So many books, so little time. I had one year as a clean sweep; the 2007 list of selections.

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## amyb

I hope you are right, Andy. So many retail stores no longer around-Record stores, Blockbusters, stationery stores, printers. Just one local book store in my area now-and she is struggling.I know, things change.

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## MIke R

my books are *always* full price..and never a problem moving them....so far ( knocking wood)

I think books in a home are a great look...we have shelves and shelves of them in multiple rooms.....this way in a few years when technology drives all the Ma Pa Brick and Mortars out of business we will have something to lament

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## Grey

We are swimming in books too and as much as I love my hard copies it's time for us to get an e-reader.  The books were taking over!  Is Kindle the way to go?

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## JEK

My wife is all about Kindle. I like the Kindle reader on the iPad. If you could use the other iPad functions, the Kindle app is great except in bright sunlight. The Kindle is great except in the dark. Price points $189-$139 for Kindle; $499 -$829 for iPad.

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## andynap

> We are swimming in books too and as much as I love my hard copies it's time for us to get an e-reader.  The books were taking over!  Is Kindle the way to go?




The answer is called "Library".

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## Grey

Does that mean the Kindle reader on the IPad doesn't work at the beach?

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## JEK

It works, but the screen is hard to read in full direct sunlight as it is backlit. The Kindle needs ambient light (not backlit) so it is very readable in the sun. In a dark room, the Kindle isn't readable and the iPad is readable.

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## amyb

I bring boxloads of books to the Boys/Girls Club or the 3 local libraries to support their used books sales.

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## KevinS

> Interesting pricing on Follett's new book - Kindle more than hardcover.



That's not uncommon.  It must be because it costs oh so much more to not print and not ship an e-book than it does to print and ship a hardcover.  :Wink:

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## julianne

Although I can appreciate the practicality of a Kindle for travel, I will continue to collect and enjoy books, as, well, books. The thrill of opening a new book and savoring that new book smell--ah-h-h--to begin another adventure. Or to discover, on the dusty shelf of an old bookstore, a first edition of a favorite read from years past. Somehow, a Kindle fails to inspire the same emotions.

One of my most treasured gifts is the complete set of original Lucy Fitch Perkins' "The Twins" books which my husband lovingly and secretly purchased on Ebay and in stores. As I turn the pages of these amazing books, illustrated by the author, I can't help but think that ebooks of the same stories wouldn't quite cut it for me.

No doubt libraries of the future will "lend" books via the internet but I'm convinced that people will still want doses of the real thing.

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## amyb

I agree, Julianne. I have a twin brother and enjoyed reading quite a few books about the Bobbsey Twins by Laura Lee Hope.

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