h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

How many books have you got on the go Osh? I struggle to read one book every six months if I'm lucky...then again, I read a lot of theory books...but if I'm honest they're basically just for the pictures. I'm not really 26, I'm actually five and my favourite books involve colouring in.

usually 2. I have one easy to read thing (currently usually Georgette Heyer or Terry Pratchett because my mum gave me a whole pile of them) and one less easy to read as my lunchtime (at work) or evening read. Often non-fiction (and usually either physics or some kind of economics or behavioural economics thing at the mo).

I'm in between ou courses at the moment so I can catch up on something a bit challenging. which means that I'll most probably pick up Self - Into the Grey is a young adult and could possibly be fitted in a bit later.

Sho -

I'm Sho btw.
Last year I read 100 books. This year (due to OU) my target is 75 - but I almost never do anything else apart from read. No housework of any kind, or cooking or anything. Just reading.

I feel like I'm in a reading rut; I just finished the 3rd book in a series I'm only lukewarm on -- Kim Harrison's "Rachel Morgan" series. I'm leaning to starting the series of books that Case Studies is the first one of. By Atkinson? Does anyone recommend it/them? Liked watching the TV presentation.

Nice to meet you Sho, that's an awful lot of books!

I think I read a grand total of four last year, along with housework, cooking, work and making things I'm a really slow reader! Being dyslexic doesn't help, I've never read a lot...slow reading does mean I retain a lot of detail, which was always helpful in uni. Plus that was just novels, generally alongside I will be dipping in and out of lots of jewellery and metalsmithing books along with ones on image & identity and creative thinking...I'm a design geek

When I finished my Masters I bought a tonne of books to read and I still haven't gotten through them. Then again I go through phases where I read loads and ones where I read nothing. I think I'm in a lull right now. Tends to happen after finishing a book I like.

My sister just finished Case Histories and loved it. She'd tried it a few years ago and couldn't get into it, but tried again after watching the series and really enjoyed them.

Behind the Scenes is always on my reading list and I'm still to get to it!

Thanks, Em, I'll go for Case Histories then (I knew it was Case something... ).

I've been reading a ton more since I got the Kindle app for my iPod Touch. Knew it would work out okay, after I real all three of the "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo..." books without eyestrain. Now I'm debating jumping on the Amazon Fire bandwagon.

I think a Kindle would have been great during uni, would have saved a load of backache and waiting around for the book you need to be returned! And if I was travelling I would use one, but I like books. I love the look, feel and smell of them and when I love a book a lot I try and buy it in hardback. I hate the idea of e-books phasing out proper books.


It's like the idea of loosing CDs, I always love the inserts and art work and the effort that goes into making and mp3s, though I am happy to download, are so impersonal!

Then again, might be the designer in me worrying about the poor out of work artwork designers

I'm still peeved that we don't get the fantastic sleeve artwork that we had with vinyl

I'd like a kindle (or other e-book) for my uni books, but I do like to write in them, and I just adore the smell of a new book. So it's dead trees all the way for me.

I love vinyl. And Though I grew up with CDs I agree, vinyl had superior artwork. One I always remember of dads is Led Zeppelin III.

Sho that's the other thing I like books for. Then again I try not too, every single jewellery book I own has post-it notes, magazine clippings and scribbled notes to myself in them.

Then again, I'm sure that's the next thing they'll come up with. Editable, note-able e-books.

they already have. My Kindle app allows, notes, highlighting and even the ability to share through Amazon what I've written with other readers of the same book. Kindles have always allowed annotation, although the latest, $79 one has no keyboard.

I *love* tree books; but I went homeless for two years, and couldn't keep my collection, so I had to donate them as there wasn't time to sell them and I had no money for storage. BROKE MY HEART! Still does, and I'd rather keep my literary friends in a grab-and-go format, than lose them again. Just my .

On the subject of a 'to read' shelf: About 3 years ago I catalogued all our books. One category I used was 'Not Read', and I had around 180 books in that category. I just checked and I still have 162 books 'Not Read'. That sounds like I haven't read much over the last 3 years. I've read quite a lot, although not as much as I could. The lack of progress is down to the number of books I've added to the catalogue over those 3 years. I don't want to think how many that is.

At least on the Kindle any new books aren't taking up shelf space. And about 20 of the 'Not Read' books are classics that have been transferred to my Sony or Kindle, so they're not taking up shelf space either.

I got books for my birthday in Åugust, including ym current one, am making steady progress, but they are all hard backs and huge.

Ah now that's interesting about beingable to make notes on the kindle. I really think I need to get a hold of one, in the flesh, so to speak, and have a really good look how they work.

SC when I left home I left all my books with my parents (mostly famous five and all that but generally everything I'd ever read up to the age of 18) and when my dad left the army I had no way to get back to save them and they couldn't take them with them to their new place so they were donated to the local school. Slowly I'm getting my favourites back from second hand sources.

Being able to get the classics on a kindle, mostly for free or for a very low price, is extremely tempting I have to say.

Temptation I have to admit I fell into. I got the collected works of Jane Austen for free on my ipod and while I would choose the book over the screen, it is convenient when you're waiting for something or someone outside the house.

Kindle question actually: I read a lot of technical books (i.e. lots of pictures! YAY! ) anyone have any idea what the quality's like? If it's good I'd serious consider one if I went back to do a PhD. No more heavy book bags! Oh the joy!

Picture quality is OK, but not brilliant, IMO. If you're reading a PDF file, you have options like zooming in, I believe. That option isn't there for books.

You'll probably be OK using a Kindle for Physics texts. It's more of a problem if you have set books that you need to make references to in an assignment. There's little/no correlation between Kindle 'locations' and page numbers. This may be changing. Books that are published as ebooks at the same time as tree-books may have page numbers that correspond to the tree-book pages. However, if your set book is an older one this won't be the case, particularly if there have been several different editions of the book.

think I'll stick to tree books for studying then!

me too - thanks for that info. I've been vacilitang about the kindle and that's pushed me back into the "no" side

I'd love to be able to use my Kindle for my OU set books. I'm doing courses that have 'literature' set books. One I'm planning to do has 12 set books! The RRP for these books is over £100. (There is a company that supplies complete sets of OU set books. Their price is £72. Or there's Amazon.) Then there's the amount of shelf space they'll take up, the fact that I may never want to read the books again once I've finished with them...

From personal experience, Sho, you don't need paper copies of every set book. When you get your course materials, look at your assignments. See which assignments require, or are likely to require, reference to a set book. Buy paper versions of those. You should be able to get away with ebook versions of everything else - if you can get them.

Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed the last course I did. I'm just not sure I'll ever want to read the plays, poetry, or short stories again. Mind you, I'm not sure which, if any, are available as ebooks.

My experience with illustrated text is, if you're on the Kindle app for iPod/iPhone, the pictures are tiny, but can be zoomed in on with a tap. On a larger Kindle, say a 7" screen and up, it should be much better. And the zoomed images on my iPod sharpen up after a couple of seconds, so clarity isn't too bad. I got a copy of "The Illustrated SuperFreakonomics", and a number of the images were from photo archives, and graphs. I was surprised how well those looked. You mileage may, of course, vary.