2011 My year in Review pt.2

This is about to come out bass ackwards but I am about to talk about my e-book library, wait why is this backwards you ask? Because I did not start collecting or reading E-books(or digital comics for that matter) until I got my Toshiba Thrive 10.1 on Black Friday(pictured to the right. So since I have yet to do a review or even talk about said Thrive since I got it to talk about something I use an object for and yet not the object(at least in my mind) is a little backwards, maybe I will talk about the Thrive in my next post.

Okay enough stalling, after Black Friday I started what is quickly becoming a favorite addiction:Collecting E-books and digital comics. The reason this is my favorite addiction is because do you see that little beauty up there in the top right corner so far I have at least 75 e-comics and roughly 35 books on that bad boy. now I don't know what kind of comic book collector you are, but let me tell you I would need a steamer trunk to carry around all those comics and that just isn't convenient as compared to that barely 2 lbs of my Thrive. And now those long car trips I used to complain about back when all I had was my blackberry and some tunes have gotten a whole lot more interesting so without further adieu:

E-books and Digital comics



For those who have not been reading the Ponderings long, you may not know of my addiction to reading, whether it be sci fi, fantasy, mythology, suspense, intrigue, I love a good book the only problem with my love of a good book is the fact that I have to carry them around. Now yes I know "but everybody has to carry books around" yes that is true, the thing is what happens when you finish one book and are in the mood for another one yet you aren't in your house or where you usually store your books? Yeah that sucks especially if you underestimated how long you were going to be sitting around either waiting or with free time on your hands. Now tadaaaaaaah, enter my E-book addiction, I can buy books in a series, and have it in my library to read so that as soon as I am done with one book just hit my digital library, back out and pick another one(which is awesome). And it seems most e-readers will save you place in a book even if the device is turned off which means unless you have a douche nozzle for a sibling(and I have two) and they decide to flip the pages on you while you are reading you never really lose your place. Granted while I am complaining I could also just go ahead and place a book mark on the page, but I read quickly so that would kind of be silly for me, I would only need to reread the page and head back, that is unless I let them hold it and they flipped like 50 pages ahead on me I don't know about Lank, but Ero just might if I really pissed him off that day.

Now there are many E-readers out there as well as e-book sellers. The two biggest are probably Amazon.com/Kindle(Amazon's e-reader) and B&N/Nook(Barnes and Nobles e-reader) for those who do not have tablets you may say but you don't have a kindle or a nook no I don't but both of those book sellers have Apps on the android market that will not only allow you to buy your books online and then download them to your device, they also let you read the books within the app. So who do I use? Both, now to be fair my wife works for ONE of the companies(no I am not saying who, now if this is not a fair disclosure statement I will amend it later. I am admitting that I do get SOME benefit from purchases from one of those two companies) I just listed so normally I would buy them from that company but that doesn't mean I ignore the other. My reasoning is simple, not every company lists the same free books at the same time, let me repeat that by itself bolded, and accentuated

NOT EVERY COMPANY LISTS THE SAME FREE BOOKS AT THE SAME TIME

What that means is that if say Kindle has Don Quixote for free right now, Nook might have great expectations or The Great Train Robbery. Now while some of these books I would buy anyway, nothing is wrong with being a frugal reader and deciding to take advantage of free offerings. so if there is an older but goody you are interested in and you have downloaded both apps I say check their free books sections or even search for the book you want and see if there is anything that catches your eye.  I also say look for sales on certain books, sometimes one or the other will have a sale on one book that the other company doesn't(and sometimes they will both have the same book on sale at the same price, just a different version. like Wicked the book I reviewed in the previous post I bought the one with extended features for 2 or 3 bucks vs the 10.99 for the regular edition) so yes I have two different Apps with two different looking libraries. Going in alpabetical order I will do pictures of each.

The two pictures above are my Kindle Library, yup I forgot to flip them DOH! I have 28 books in my kindle library at the moment and except for Robopocalypse they were ALL FREE, yup 27 free books, straight awesomeness. I have read a few of them, not all thats a lot of books and this is of course not my only book library. Below I am going to post the picture of my Nook nook library

There are only 12 books in there most of them I paid for only because I didn't see them free anywhere else and I usually default to Barnes & Noble when I buy books, mainly because I like walking in to their cafe's to also buy my coffee(yeah yeah I know when did I get a Starbucks addiction too, I'll address that later). So as you can see I have at least 40 books in my digital e-library on my tablet, Actually 14 the Hunger Games book you see with the blue tab on it is actually the whole trilogy in one book. The differences between the two apps are with Nook the book you are currently reading has that blue "n" tab on it and gets moved to the top while with Kindle whatever book you are reading just becomes the top in the list. I also like the fact that both apps allow you to highlight text and either search for the definition of the word, "mark" it in case you wish to come back to it later, or select the context say possibly if you are trying to right a book report or something and that is something that you feel really sticks out for you. Which could be helpful for students or possibly book clubs(which I have joined to of now, granted I had to slow my reading down on the book because I was flying through with my tablet) so yes if you are asking me if I love e-readers/tablets/digital copy the answer is yes. Also since you sign up for an account when you download these services any book you have on your tablet can be transferred to another device as soon as you sign in with your account. So say I log in to my amazon account with my laptop and want to see what books I purchased viola there they are and if I have an e-reading program on my laptop I COULD continue reading it from there(granted my tablet is never far away so it would more likely be the opposite, buy it on the laptop read it on the tablet as long as I have a Wi-Fi connection).

I didn't take any pictures of my digital comics mainly because it's so many of them. I have most of the DC new 52 stored either on my tablet or my laptop, and a good portion of Marvels library(ultimate and regular universe) which has allowed me to quickly catch up on a lot of series that I had either missed or lost over the years. I am especially liking my collection of Marvel Major Chronologies(all the major events that have been released in either issue by issue or crossover form over the years). I am currently trying to find some of the older DC digitals, I'm not as big a DC fan but hey I can at least look. I love a good story period, I just think Marvel tells better ones doesn't mean now that I can read them on my tablet I am gonna turn my nose up at them. Easier to carry and I don't have to worry about where to store them or the comics getting damaged(yes it is the little things and anyone who has younger siblings or a helpful mother can tell you the horrors of having your collection damaged or trashed) and once again I can keep on reading once I am done with the issue I am on, and if I don't have the next issue of whatever character I am reading I can move on to someone else(which is awesome sauce). Now some may say well if it is so great why did you just start collecting them now?

Simple I didn't have a tablet to read them on, I was still researching tables and I didn't want to read them on the phone I got the 10.1 in tablet because I hate staring at small screens, I want to be able to see the intricate details even if they are slightly spread out. And it seems my wait was well worth it, now yes there are other e-reader apps out there besides Nook and Kindle, but I like those two and so far they have done fine by me. The only issue I have is adding said books to my good ol Shelfari down there at the bottom of the screen I have been a reading fool but at the moment they don't seem to sync up, so I just have to log in and keep adding them slowly but surely. Now I guess I should mention WHAT I have read(yup I get all the way down to the bottom and I am about to end it and THEN I think about telling you what I have read).

In the nook app I have read:The Son of Neptune(book 2 in the Heroes of Olympus Series), I Am Number Four and The Power of Six (the first two books in the Lorien Legacies), and now Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West(book one of the Wicked Years). In the Kindle app I have read Robopocalypse, What Is HTML5?, and What's New in Java 7? So 7 books in like 2 months not including the comics that's a little over a book a week(Black Friday was November 25 it's only January 19 so just under 8 weeks) and I will check my records but I think except for possibly Wicked I bought them all before the new year. Odd thing is I didn't set any reading goals for myself, now knowing that I read way more often then I right no I will not be blogging about every book I read, I don't think. If I do well what do you know looks like they will be even more posts on the Ponderings. Now I may take a step back and go through and give my feelings on some of the DC New 52 comics, or even the new Black Spider-man in Ultimate Spider-man but I am not saying I will be a blogging fool but if you do see a lot more posts than even last year you know why.