Just got my 3rd Kindle. Cannot find the other 2 probably lurking on my jumbled shelves still. Although the new one IS a bit small ,can just about go without my Readers on
For a reminder about the importance of reading books, we can refer to Fahrenheit 451. The books at that time were so precious that individuals memorized whole books.
I would second this for physical copies of movies and music as well, though they do come with the slight drawback of needing a bit more hardware to use than books do.
Don't conflate 'e-book' with 'corporate-controlled licensed (e.g. Amazon Kindle) book'
My wife and I love paper books, we have owned many thousands over the decades, and I have spent many many hours in libraries and bookstores of all sizes, so... it is safe to say I know from books.
But... ever since I had two successive retinal detachments in my right eye seven years ago, regular printed books have been difficult to make out, and I have been 100% e-book. I continue to read as much as I ever have.
If you don't want to be beholden to Amazon or Rakuten (Kobo), it is very easy to purchase e-book files directly from publishers (or in some cases from authors) in the EPUB format that everyone uses these days, download them to the storage and backup media of your choice, and load them into a wide variety of e-reader devices and applications for viewing.
And there's lots of public domain ebooks, too, available for free. Standard Ebooks, for example, takes public domain ebooks and programs them well to take advantage of the latest e-reader technologies, and makes them available for all e-reader devices (iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, Nook, etc.). And they have always refused to censor or alter anything (except for modernizing certain spelling and punctuation, which they are always up-front when they do so). They're always my go-to when I'm looking for any ebooks from the public domain, and they are always looking for volunteers to help them produce ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/
I completely agree, e-books are amazing! If you know how to properly use them, they make the entire literary world more accessible, portable, and egalitarian. Having lived in USSR, I know that people had lives ruined over books they owned. An epub file can be safely stored in encrypted storage and infinitely duplicated for friend and allies, sent over borders, or deleted. Printed books are a great backup medium. It's great that you enjoy your bookshelf, and we definitely need libraries as a fail safe repository. But e-books are one of the greatest things that computers have enabled. Don't conflate Amazon bullshit with e-books pls.
I feel constantly pulled between the desire to give away some of my books to be a bit less materialistic and the desire to have every available surface stacked with enough books that I could never finish them all.
Maybe there's a happy medium (constant cycle of collecting and giving away).
I have not yet found such a medium, despite my wife and daughters' near-constant goading to get rid of more and more of my 5,000+ book library. I live firmly in Umberto Eco's camp: the efficacy of a personal library lies not in whether one will read them all, but in the precious blood one will certainly need in the contentious future.
I own many books which I think it is improbable I'll live long enough to read. But having them here, in my apartment, provides a sustenance and a cheer which I can liken only to Holy Communion.
Digital world does not run on fairy dust so thinking that get rid of books and such only outsources the consumption of the material world out of sight. The problem anyway is not that we are too materialistic but rather that we are not really materialistic at all. At least in the sense of actually valuing the things we create and consume.
"The bookleggers smuggled books to the southwest desert and buried them there in kegs. The memorizers committed to rote memory entire volumes of history, sacred writings, literature, and science, in case some unfortunate book smuggler was caught, tortured, and forced to reveal the location of the kegs…
The project, aimed at saving a small remnant of human culture from the remnant of humanity who wanted it destroyed, was then underway."
Ruth thank you for sharing. It will be an interesting read. A few scholars have drawn conclusions about "woke left" and "woke right" and both lead to the same end—word policing. I quickly skimmed the article and am reminded that each time a nation declines, institutions of learning and information goes first. Surprisingly, this time we haven't noticed it.
I've been saying for a little while now that the best search engine out there is your local library. That can be amended with contributions to your own self curated library of course.
Most public libraries are spending more and more resources on non-book items such as computers, videos and e-books. Those things take up space so they cull classics to make room.
Hi there Gretchen. I've worked at a public library for the past 25 years, so I know what you are talking about. I've seen the trends, and was here for some of the transitions you mentioned. That said, I am lucky to work in one of the systems that is consistently ranked within the top 10 library systems in the country. We still buy a lot of books. Though I am not a huge fan of ebooks for the reasons our kind host has mentioned, people do use our e-resources and at least they reading. At our main branch there are three public floors across two buildings, and four floors of stacks. While we do weed out old books like e.c. mentioned below, we are committed to retaining quite a bit of other books. Going through the stacks to find those old tomes is one of my favorite things, and I've gotten a real education working here.
I am happy the library does get videos though because I've seen a lot of crazy world cinema movies I probably wouldn't have known about if I'd had to rely on video stores (back in the day) or the streaming services now, which don't make them as easily browsable as a shelf in the library.
Likewise I am really happy for all the music CDs the library has bought and its great collection of classical, jazz and popular styles. It allows me to continue to DJ on the radio, and given me a chance to listen to pretty much all kinds of stuff I might not have purchased for myself.
For public libraries I think there does need to be mostly books, then music on CD, and some DVDs. A lot of people who can't afford streaming services come in and borrow our DVDs allowing their family some entertainment. Or is used by those who don't want to give there money to Bezos & co...
Finally the same is true of our computers. I wish they still had a few typewriters like when I started, but even though huge portions of the internet aren't worth looking at, so many essential services are done through the internet, that homeless people and others in need do have a place to come where they can check their email, fill out applications, etc. So I think it is good to have some computers for people to use.
No, they did exactly that in our small Oregon town of 30k population. You would think they would try and care for their sacred repository status. But no. First big FOL sale I scored an original 5 book set of Winston Churchill’s History of the English-Speaking Peoples. With dust jackets. Plus many other astounding classics. They did not replace them with modern editions of same title. Only the Fantasy/SciFi, Detective, and Romance titles were expanded and featured.
Yes but in fairly recent histories, all too many libraries culled books that were absolute classics, with no regard for value of content or why they should keep them available to the public. They gave up and devoted their shelves to what they felt people wanted: romance, detective, and science fiction/fantasy. There are retail bookstores in small towns that do that much. So what is the point of public taxpayers only paying for common trash?
Yo, e.c. ... I love the Friends of the Library (the org that usually puts on those book sales). Yeah, we have to discard some stuff. I've built up my own book collection very well from hitting up those used sales, or where I am, going to their shop/warehouse to find books. All the money gets fed back into library programs so its a win-win.
This is why I think it’s so important for us to have our private libraries. I don’t have hope of reading half of what I own, but I like to know they are still here and in print form, even some new books that libraries aren’t interested in.
I have far more books than I will ever be able to read - I am 70 - and I revel in that fact and love that I have choice and agency that no one can take away from me. I will continue to acquire books, the knowledge they bring and the joy they bring as long as I live.
I bought an old collection of Dahl's books just in case I have grandchildren. im collecting physical books for all the reasons you laid out. Im focussing on "classics".
Edward Stratemeyer was a kind and farsighted man who, a hundred years ago, grasped that many children weren't falling in love with reading who might do so if books were available to them which they would want to read. And thus were born The Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Tom Swift, and several more.
There is a Facebook group populated almost entirely by Boomers who have a grudge and are on a perpetual search for Hardy Boys books. Ah, but they're available, you say? Well, yes, they are, but anticipating the high tide of political correctness, the Stratemeyer syndicate, or whatever it's called, long ago purified them of any inelegance which, though acceptable in 1930, might tend to irritate certain contemporary readers. I don't know what changes were made, but the lesson is that if they'll eff with The Hardy Boys, no original writing is safe.
For some temperamental reason, I prefer paperbacks to hardbacks, and I certainly prefer the generally much cheaper prices, but any hardback you can get probably has a better chance of not having been tampered with by a publisher, and certainly has a much better chance of lasting longer physically, because unless things have changed, the paper used in printing them is of much better quality.
Compare the paper of a hardback you've owned for twenty years with the paper of a paperback you've owned approximately as long. And really, you can forget about the twenty years. There can be a great disparity in the comparative time you've owned each: recently, I was looking over a hardback of Evelyn Waugh's Sword of Honour trilogy. I bought it in 2005. The paper is clean and white. But a paperback copy of Ray Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes which I bought at most seven years ago and which I looked at equally recently had paper so yellowed and generally dilapidated that I threw it out and will be ordering another copy. I trust it won't have been "updated."
There is a newly published edition of Orwell's 1984. I don't know whether the text has been messed with. I do know that it has an introduction in which the writer apologizes for some of Winston's less than currently acceptable reactions.
Wonderful piece! So jealous that you have Questioning Minds! I am a generation younger than you and for years, I’ve been collecting books (thousands!) in this paranoid fear we ate going to need to preserve something. I don’t feel so paranoid anymore.
I’m doing the same with jazz CD’s. I pick up one or two each month, often used copies of classic releases in fear of a coming apocalypse of physical media.
Your instincts have been sound, and many have shared them, and collected as you have done. I wish there were a way we could be at least prospectively in contact with everyone who has these instincts, and has been collecting, also. But how could we subvert surveillance? Carrier pigeon?
Of course, books come about because of writers and publishers. If you aren’t supporter them, then you’ll have no new books. The old ones are great, of course, but we need to support those who create new books, as well.
Amen Brother. If you are ever in Oxford, Mississippi stop by Square Books. It's not a big bookstore but everything on its shelves is significant, not a single dud that I could tell. The Faulkner section takes up about 50 linear feet. And check out Waterstones in Cambridge England. Waterstones will make you realize how puerile most American chain bookstores are. They have a collection of tracts and pamphlets that they publish themselves based on ideas and writers from the 18th and 19th centuries--the full versions of things you only get in anthology excerpts today.
I did a book tour that brought me to Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi, and I had a grand time. We recorded a Thacker Mountain Radio broadcast there, and I also played piano. (I wish I had a recording of that broadcast.) The people were friendly and I autographed lots of books. I have very happy memories of that visit.
As both a print and an Ebook enthusiast, I agree wholeheartedly with what you say about the advantages of print books. And while print books might be the ultimate "killer app", they have a massive Achilles' Heel: the cost of transportation.
Here in New Zealand, what used to cost three or four dollars to ship a book from America now costs $25-35 for a paperback. Even more for a hardbound copy. I often have Amazon drop-ship copies of my own books to people in the US. The shipping usually costs me more than twice what the book cost. And shipping costs are only going to RISE, as energy costs escalate. The obvious answer is to print them locally, though that's problematic.
So while I'd LOVE to keep buying print copies of books, I've gone almost entirely to Kindle and Ebooks. I read with a simple Paperwhite Kindle, so I'm not constantly diverted with internet links, videos, etc. It's as close to print as I've gotten with computers, but it's still not as good as holding a book in my hands. And incidentally, I still read a REAL newspaper every day.
But your points about Amazon's (and others') alteration of books--especially classics--is spot on. It's a dangerous, slippery slope, and one we should all be aware of. Thanks for another fine article.
It's true. Many Americans are unaware of how expensive it is to print and ship books. Sticker prices have stayed much the same (with notable exceptions), so smaller presses have to print shorter runs and otherwise eat the cost on distribution expenses. It's not easy to make it all pencil out.
Books used to be so much cheaper to ship. I used to order books from the UK all the time, because shipping was nominal. France, too.
Now, it’s exorbitant.
Last year, I was lucky enough to visit Portugal. I brought an extra bag and flew home a whole suitcase of books in Portuguese, as they’re almost impossible to get here.
Agree with my whole heart! My books are friends of highest order. They only argue on a clear and logical basis; they make their points clearly and with constructive ideas and thinking processes. They are always welcome in my home at any time. They give me hope for the future and hold out against assaults upon the human mind and body. Books contain life's mysteries and solutions. Get books. They are good for you.
It's not an unrelated thing that a rich first cousin of mine who is a psychopath despises public libraries, because his county takes an unnoticeable amount of his money each year to help fund its library.
I am amazed at the number of people saying they have so many books they cannot read. I buy a book and read it...Sometimes twice because I was too young to get it when I read it the first time. Also I dropped kindle a long time ago. It seemed very convenient for long plane trips, etc. but trying to find a particular book again was difficult. I had to scroll through all of them without any sort of rhyme or reason for the arrangement. Also when I upgraded to a new kindle, I lost all my old books. Paper for me, baby.
The book is a huge advance technologically over a laptop:
* Has virtually infinite battery life
* Is extremely shock resistant - can withstand a drop of at least 10 feet onto a concrete floor
* Although not extremely water resistant, even after complete immersion the data can eventually be retrieved
* Fully Random-Access,with the ability to add notes
* High contrast display
* Inexpensive compared to a laptop
The only problem I have is that the type seems to be getting smaller. At least on Kindle you can change the type face and size.
Just got my 3rd Kindle. Cannot find the other 2 probably lurking on my jumbled shelves still. Although the new one IS a bit small ,can just about go without my Readers on
For a reminder about the importance of reading books, we can refer to Fahrenheit 451. The books at that time were so precious that individuals memorized whole books.
I immediately thought of that classic.
I kept wondering whether Bezos is so soulless he'd capitulate to book-burners.
I would second this for physical copies of movies and music as well, though they do come with the slight drawback of needing a bit more hardware to use than books do.
Don't conflate 'e-book' with 'corporate-controlled licensed (e.g. Amazon Kindle) book'
My wife and I love paper books, we have owned many thousands over the decades, and I have spent many many hours in libraries and bookstores of all sizes, so... it is safe to say I know from books.
But... ever since I had two successive retinal detachments in my right eye seven years ago, regular printed books have been difficult to make out, and I have been 100% e-book. I continue to read as much as I ever have.
If you don't want to be beholden to Amazon or Rakuten (Kobo), it is very easy to purchase e-book files directly from publishers (or in some cases from authors) in the EPUB format that everyone uses these days, download them to the storage and backup media of your choice, and load them into a wide variety of e-reader devices and applications for viewing.
And there's lots of public domain ebooks, too, available for free. Standard Ebooks, for example, takes public domain ebooks and programs them well to take advantage of the latest e-reader technologies, and makes them available for all e-reader devices (iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, Nook, etc.). And they have always refused to censor or alter anything (except for modernizing certain spelling and punctuation, which they are always up-front when they do so). They're always my go-to when I'm looking for any ebooks from the public domain, and they are always looking for volunteers to help them produce ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/
And I imagine your local library may have e-books to check out- try the main central library, but my library offers e-books ❤️📚
I completely agree, e-books are amazing! If you know how to properly use them, they make the entire literary world more accessible, portable, and egalitarian. Having lived in USSR, I know that people had lives ruined over books they owned. An epub file can be safely stored in encrypted storage and infinitely duplicated for friend and allies, sent over borders, or deleted. Printed books are a great backup medium. It's great that you enjoy your bookshelf, and we definitely need libraries as a fail safe repository. But e-books are one of the greatest things that computers have enabled. Don't conflate Amazon bullshit with e-books pls.
Thank you for saying that!
I feel constantly pulled between the desire to give away some of my books to be a bit less materialistic and the desire to have every available surface stacked with enough books that I could never finish them all.
Maybe there's a happy medium (constant cycle of collecting and giving away).
I have not yet found such a medium, despite my wife and daughters' near-constant goading to get rid of more and more of my 5,000+ book library. I live firmly in Umberto Eco's camp: the efficacy of a personal library lies not in whether one will read them all, but in the precious blood one will certainly need in the contentious future.
I own many books which I think it is improbable I'll live long enough to read. But having them here, in my apartment, provides a sustenance and a cheer which I can liken only to Holy Communion.
Digital world does not run on fairy dust so thinking that get rid of books and such only outsources the consumption of the material world out of sight. The problem anyway is not that we are too materialistic but rather that we are not really materialistic at all. At least in the sense of actually valuing the things we create and consume.
This isn’t about getting rid of books in general. It’s asking myself how I can take a smaller share for me and give to others.
Can't take 'em with ya!
Never try to argue with a man whose TV is larger than his bookshelf. - Anon
Apologies for stealing that immediately.
I think Paul Chek said this, but not sure.
So many books, so little time. 🤘😎🤘
Reading as resistance.
Agreed! Booklegging is resistance and provides a solid data center that will last far beyond the digital. See "A Guide to Booklegging: How (and why) to collect, preserve, and read the printed word" https://schooloftheunconformed.substack.com/p/a-guide-to-booklegging-how-and-why
"The bookleggers smuggled books to the southwest desert and buried them there in kegs. The memorizers committed to rote memory entire volumes of history, sacred writings, literature, and science, in case some unfortunate book smuggler was caught, tortured, and forced to reveal the location of the kegs…
The project, aimed at saving a small remnant of human culture from the remnant of humanity who wanted it destroyed, was then underway."
from A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller
I love Canticle. More people need to read it.
Ruth thank you for sharing. It will be an interesting read. A few scholars have drawn conclusions about "woke left" and "woke right" and both lead to the same end—word policing. I quickly skimmed the article and am reminded that each time a nation declines, institutions of learning and information goes first. Surprisingly, this time we haven't noticed it.
VERY Cool!
I've been saying for a little while now that the best search engine out there is your local library. That can be amended with contributions to your own self curated library of course.
Most public libraries are spending more and more resources on non-book items such as computers, videos and e-books. Those things take up space so they cull classics to make room.
Hi there Gretchen. I've worked at a public library for the past 25 years, so I know what you are talking about. I've seen the trends, and was here for some of the transitions you mentioned. That said, I am lucky to work in one of the systems that is consistently ranked within the top 10 library systems in the country. We still buy a lot of books. Though I am not a huge fan of ebooks for the reasons our kind host has mentioned, people do use our e-resources and at least they reading. At our main branch there are three public floors across two buildings, and four floors of stacks. While we do weed out old books like e.c. mentioned below, we are committed to retaining quite a bit of other books. Going through the stacks to find those old tomes is one of my favorite things, and I've gotten a real education working here.
I am happy the library does get videos though because I've seen a lot of crazy world cinema movies I probably wouldn't have known about if I'd had to rely on video stores (back in the day) or the streaming services now, which don't make them as easily browsable as a shelf in the library.
Likewise I am really happy for all the music CDs the library has bought and its great collection of classical, jazz and popular styles. It allows me to continue to DJ on the radio, and given me a chance to listen to pretty much all kinds of stuff I might not have purchased for myself.
For public libraries I think there does need to be mostly books, then music on CD, and some DVDs. A lot of people who can't afford streaming services come in and borrow our DVDs allowing their family some entertainment. Or is used by those who don't want to give there money to Bezos & co...
Finally the same is true of our computers. I wish they still had a few typewriters like when I started, but even though huge portions of the internet aren't worth looking at, so many essential services are done through the internet, that homeless people and others in need do have a place to come where they can check their email, fill out applications, etc. So I think it is good to have some computers for people to use.
I used to work at a library and this is exactly what I saw. Tragic.
No, they did exactly that in our small Oregon town of 30k population. You would think they would try and care for their sacred repository status. But no. First big FOL sale I scored an original 5 book set of Winston Churchill’s History of the English-Speaking Peoples. With dust jackets. Plus many other astounding classics. They did not replace them with modern editions of same title. Only the Fantasy/SciFi, Detective, and Romance titles were expanded and featured.
Did you see this discussion I linked to above? Sparked by Mary Harrington.
https://substack.com/@ruthgaskovski/note/c-144269897?r=891oi
Yes but in fairly recent histories, all too many libraries culled books that were absolute classics, with no regard for value of content or why they should keep them available to the public. They gave up and devoted their shelves to what they felt people wanted: romance, detective, and science fiction/fantasy. There are retail bookstores in small towns that do that much. So what is the point of public taxpayers only paying for common trash?
Yo, e.c. ... I love the Friends of the Library (the org that usually puts on those book sales). Yeah, we have to discard some stuff. I've built up my own book collection very well from hitting up those used sales, or where I am, going to their shop/warehouse to find books. All the money gets fed back into library programs so its a win-win.
Marry Harrington sparked a discussion of library resources here: https://substack.com/@ruthgaskovski/note/c-144269897?r=891oi
This is why I think it’s so important for us to have our private libraries. I don’t have hope of reading half of what I own, but I like to know they are still here and in print form, even some new books that libraries aren’t interested in.
I have far more books than I will ever be able to read - I am 70 - and I revel in that fact and love that I have choice and agency that no one can take away from me. I will continue to acquire books, the knowledge they bring and the joy they bring as long as I live.
I bought an old collection of Dahl's books just in case I have grandchildren. im collecting physical books for all the reasons you laid out. Im focussing on "classics".
Here's how sinister the times are:
Edward Stratemeyer was a kind and farsighted man who, a hundred years ago, grasped that many children weren't falling in love with reading who might do so if books were available to them which they would want to read. And thus were born The Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Tom Swift, and several more.
There is a Facebook group populated almost entirely by Boomers who have a grudge and are on a perpetual search for Hardy Boys books. Ah, but they're available, you say? Well, yes, they are, but anticipating the high tide of political correctness, the Stratemeyer syndicate, or whatever it's called, long ago purified them of any inelegance which, though acceptable in 1930, might tend to irritate certain contemporary readers. I don't know what changes were made, but the lesson is that if they'll eff with The Hardy Boys, no original writing is safe.
For some temperamental reason, I prefer paperbacks to hardbacks, and I certainly prefer the generally much cheaper prices, but any hardback you can get probably has a better chance of not having been tampered with by a publisher, and certainly has a much better chance of lasting longer physically, because unless things have changed, the paper used in printing them is of much better quality.
Compare the paper of a hardback you've owned for twenty years with the paper of a paperback you've owned approximately as long. And really, you can forget about the twenty years. There can be a great disparity in the comparative time you've owned each: recently, I was looking over a hardback of Evelyn Waugh's Sword of Honour trilogy. I bought it in 2005. The paper is clean and white. But a paperback copy of Ray Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes which I bought at most seven years ago and which I looked at equally recently had paper so yellowed and generally dilapidated that I threw it out and will be ordering another copy. I trust it won't have been "updated."
There is a newly published edition of Orwell's 1984. I don't know whether the text has been messed with. I do know that it has an introduction in which the writer apologizes for some of Winston's less than currently acceptable reactions.
Cuz you know Winston needed some fixin'.
Indeed. It's creepy.
Thank you for the suggestion!
Wonderful piece! So jealous that you have Questioning Minds! I am a generation younger than you and for years, I’ve been collecting books (thousands!) in this paranoid fear we ate going to need to preserve something. I don’t feel so paranoid anymore.
I’m doing the same with jazz CD’s. I pick up one or two each month, often used copies of classic releases in fear of a coming apocalypse of physical media.
Your instincts have been sound, and many have shared them, and collected as you have done. I wish there were a way we could be at least prospectively in contact with everyone who has these instincts, and has been collecting, also. But how could we subvert surveillance? Carrier pigeon?
Congrats on your impressive book collection. Someday you may be very glad you found them worthy of hanging on to.
Thanks!
Of course, books come about because of writers and publishers. If you aren’t supporter them, then you’ll have no new books. The old ones are great, of course, but we need to support those who create new books, as well.
Let’s support the *good* writers- there are plenty of newer books not worth spending time or money on.
Amen Brother. If you are ever in Oxford, Mississippi stop by Square Books. It's not a big bookstore but everything on its shelves is significant, not a single dud that I could tell. The Faulkner section takes up about 50 linear feet. And check out Waterstones in Cambridge England. Waterstones will make you realize how puerile most American chain bookstores are. They have a collection of tracts and pamphlets that they publish themselves based on ideas and writers from the 18th and 19th centuries--the full versions of things you only get in anthology excerpts today.
I did a book tour that brought me to Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi, and I had a grand time. We recorded a Thacker Mountain Radio broadcast there, and I also played piano. (I wish I had a recording of that broadcast.) The people were friendly and I autographed lots of books. I have very happy memories of that visit.
As both a print and an Ebook enthusiast, I agree wholeheartedly with what you say about the advantages of print books. And while print books might be the ultimate "killer app", they have a massive Achilles' Heel: the cost of transportation.
Here in New Zealand, what used to cost three or four dollars to ship a book from America now costs $25-35 for a paperback. Even more for a hardbound copy. I often have Amazon drop-ship copies of my own books to people in the US. The shipping usually costs me more than twice what the book cost. And shipping costs are only going to RISE, as energy costs escalate. The obvious answer is to print them locally, though that's problematic.
So while I'd LOVE to keep buying print copies of books, I've gone almost entirely to Kindle and Ebooks. I read with a simple Paperwhite Kindle, so I'm not constantly diverted with internet links, videos, etc. It's as close to print as I've gotten with computers, but it's still not as good as holding a book in my hands. And incidentally, I still read a REAL newspaper every day.
But your points about Amazon's (and others') alteration of books--especially classics--is spot on. It's a dangerous, slippery slope, and one we should all be aware of. Thanks for another fine article.
It's true. Many Americans are unaware of how expensive it is to print and ship books. Sticker prices have stayed much the same (with notable exceptions), so smaller presses have to print shorter runs and otherwise eat the cost on distribution expenses. It's not easy to make it all pencil out.
I didn’t realize how good we have it in the U.S.
Books used to be so much cheaper to ship. I used to order books from the UK all the time, because shipping was nominal. France, too.
Now, it’s exorbitant.
Last year, I was lucky enough to visit Portugal. I brought an extra bag and flew home a whole suitcase of books in Portuguese, as they’re almost impossible to get here.
Agree with my whole heart! My books are friends of highest order. They only argue on a clear and logical basis; they make their points clearly and with constructive ideas and thinking processes. They are always welcome in my home at any time. They give me hope for the future and hold out against assaults upon the human mind and body. Books contain life's mysteries and solutions. Get books. They are good for you.
It's not an unrelated thing that a rich first cousin of mine who is a psychopath despises public libraries, because his county takes an unnoticeable amount of his money each year to help fund its library.
Avid reader who loves books!! I hope and pray you are correct!! May we be a people of the word!!
I am amazed at the number of people saying they have so many books they cannot read. I buy a book and read it...Sometimes twice because I was too young to get it when I read it the first time. Also I dropped kindle a long time ago. It seemed very convenient for long plane trips, etc. but trying to find a particular book again was difficult. I had to scroll through all of them without any sort of rhyme or reason for the arrangement. Also when I upgraded to a new kindle, I lost all my old books. Paper for me, baby.