Cue the music from The Twilight Zone

Yesterday morning I was lying in bed, awake and daydreaming, while I waited for the ambition to actually get up.

Into my head popped thoughts of my husband’s old black lunch box.   You know the kind—round top to hold the small Thermos bottle that was held in place with a clip and prevented it from falling onto the sandwich below.  I have no idea why those thoughts came to mind.  

Then, last night I was standing beside the bed, pulling down the bedspread and arranging the pillows for a bit of reading before sleep.   Another thought popped in.   The expression “queer as a three dollar bill.”  Now considered a very non-PC slam against gays, the term used to refer to counterfeit currency.  

That led to thoughts of the seven $2 bills, crisp, new, in numerical sequence that I once had.  I didn’t question why the expression intruded in the first place.

Two utterly random thoughts, neither related, and I put them out of my mind.

So, into bed I went.   I turned on my Kindle and began reading where I’d left off in the novel “Bones of Betrayal” by the writing team of Jefferson Bass, whom I’d recently discovered and really like, so much so that this is the fifth book of theirs in little more than a week.

The plot involves the Oak Ridge facility in WWII, espionage, and radiation poisoning, so while I was surprised when I read the following, I wasn’t shaken, as homosexuality was considered a grave security risk back then and could rightly be included in the plot twists:

However, a couple chapters later I heard the theme from the Twilight Zone:

Ah, my, this kind of stuff happens frequently in my world.   When I was younger, it happened so often it scared me and I started ignoring it.   I was afraid I was causing some rather unpleasant things to happen.

Now, I rather welcome and enjoy it.

The Kindle Kerfuffle

Behold the wonderful Kindle.  It takes up no room on my already over-crowded book shelves.  A simple little package in which I have more than 125 full length books, and a dozen or so that I've archived with Amazon.

Plus two word games that I play in hopes of keeping dementia at bay.

I bought my Kindle a couple years ago, lured by the promise of new best sellers for $9.99, substantially less than the hardcover version.  And not using half my baggage weight allowance on books?  Priceless!  In addition, a number of classics were free.  And then there was the stuffed-to-the-max book shelf thing.

For a year I was thrilled, even if I had to turn it off when the airplane was taking off and landing.  That’s why I stick my nose in a book—so I am not aware of taking off and landing. 

Then early this year Amazon started listing Kindle books for $14.99.  A five dollar increase.  In some cases, the Kindle e-version of a book cost more than a hardcover book.

Kindle book $14.99, hardcover book $14.72.   What's that all about?

That really ticked off the Kindle crowd and Amazon heard about it big time.

Think of it:  An e-book is essentially a word document that is sent to your Kindle.  There's some formatting, but a whole book can be formatted with the click of a few buttons.  No fancy full cover dust jacket necessary, either.

No internet connection necessary.  Right here in Muskeg Manor I can have a new book on my Kindle in a couple minutes.  Now that is magic.  No printing costs, no shipping costs, just a click of the button and Amazon sends it to me wirelessly.

An e-book at the same price as a paperback?  Check the used paperback price.

So what’s with Kindle books priced higher than the hardcover version?  The versions that use paper, ink, designers, presses, delivery trucks, book shelf stockers, cashiers, etc?

Readers can review books on Amazon, awarding any book up to five stars.  Suddenly, Kindle crowd reviewers of best-selling authors struck back, getting mighty stingy with their stars.  So, an author like book-a-week James Patterson or John Grisham were only getting two or three stars in the reviews, and almost always because of the Kindle price.

Ta ta.

Amazon blamed it on the publishers.  Readers wouldn’t buy that, referring to Amazon’s weight in the book-selling business.  I think it's greed on the part of the publishers, wanting a bigger bite of the burgeoning e-book market.

Kindle books dropped to $12.99 for a while for some authors.  They remain at $14.99 for most.   But $12.99 is still three bucks more than $9.99.   Was the slight drop from $14.99 meant to assuage us?  Sounds like the Netflix kerfuffle to me.


And it isn’t any better at iBooks for iPad, either.    They're charging $14.99, too.

This is what gets the Kindle users:  Kindle book $12.99, paperback $9.99.

What it boils down to is $12.99 is the new $14.99 is the new $9.99.    

My purchases are much more selective and much less frequent.  I generally wait until the paperback is issued and the Kindle price drops.  Or I order used books.

Kindle book $12.99, new and used hardcovers from $3.25.

What I really want to know is whether the AUTHOR gets more money for the pricier e-book.

Oh, shoot.  I know how to find out.  I'll write my friend Sue Grafton and ask her.  I mean, we're practically pals,  She sends me post cards and Christmas cards.  Even sent me a tea bag once to enjoy a cup while reading her latest Kinsey Millhone novel.

My bud.

Is It Just Me? Or...

Seriously. Am I the only one who feels it's more than a little eerie to click on my PC and a minute later there's a whole new book on my Kindle?


Here I am in a narrow valley in Alaska, surrounded by mountains, and really, really lucky that my satellite dish can "see" over the mountain ridge to the east so I can get television.

And until recently, cell phone service depended on which carrier your contract in perpetuity was with.

And your DSL service was only slightly faster than evolution.

And there isn't even a name for where you live, so you're grouped in with everybody from Mile 18 to Mile 50 of the Seward Highway.

And not so long ago I didn't even have a street address so UPS or FedEx could find me, and then the Borough had to change my address because the street they said I lived on didn't exist in the real, dirt and gravel world.

And yet Amazon's Whispernet finds this little quarter-inch thick gadget on my desk, slightly bigger than an over-sized paperback book, and by some kind of magic a whole book appears on it in less time than it takes to make a gigantic mug of fat-free, sugar-free Good Earth cocoa chai tea.

Seriously. If Amazon can do all that, what is the gov'mint doing?

Is not that a wee bit spooky?

Big Treasures in Small Packages

When I returned home from two weeks in Halibut Cove, a cardboard box with a familiar logo was waiting for me on the end of the kitchen counter: amazon.com.

Any box from amazon.com is a highly anticipated arrival, but this one was especially so. Nevertheless, it was only after several hours that I got around to opening it. In the meantime, I was involved with an attempt to capture an injured swan at a frozen Tern Lake, a swan whose flock had flown south earlier in the day. (See previous posts.)

Finally, I opened the box and withdrew another, more slender box.

A pull tab was the key to opening this box, a tab with the words” Once upon a time…” printed on it. Already I liked this product a lot. Someone loved this product enough to care about its packaging.

And carefully nestled within that box, was my new amazon Kindle.

I unpacked all the accoutrements—the charging cord, the driver’s manual, the neoprene sleeve I’d also ordered. I plugged in the charging cord and went back to unpacking the Halibut Cove stuff.

Late at night I carried the Kindle works upstairs to the loft, and dumped them on my desk. That’s where they stayed for almost 24 hours. I still had to see about the rescue of the swan that can’t fly, and some other things to do, so the Kindle wasn’t a top priority.

Finally, Saturday evening I sat in front of my computer, fully expecting to have to download books through my computer's slower-than-evolution 1x DSL line. I’d already browsed amazon’s Kindle store, and made a list of the books I wanted to buy. I had also checked their Whispernet coverage, the means by which Kindle downloads books “in less than a minute.”

Sure enough, my little spot on earth wasn’t included in the coverage, according to the online map. I could go to Anchorage and get the fastest downloading capability, or drive a few miles towards Cooper Landing and get the slower download feed.

I read the instruction at the bottom of the six-inch screen: “Slide and release the power switch to wake.” I did. All kinds of cool information popped up—including the familiar “bars” indicating reception quality. OMG! There were five solid bars. Could it be?

Quickly I searched the instructions for how to buy my first book. I ordered Michael Connolly’s “Nine Dragons.” I noted the start time: 5:52 p.m., and went back to reading the driver’s manual. It read that when the title of the book appeared on the “Home” page, the book had finished downloading.

Holy ratziolli! The title was already there. A couple hours later I had sixteen books on my new Kindle, and had been working my way through the more than 350,000 titles available. The Kindle, amazon says, is capable of holding up to 1500 books, with more archived online. In the meantime, I’d gathered up all my books by my favorite authors, trying to make sure I wasn’t duplicating titles.

I took the Kindle to bed with me and started reading. I found it much easier to hold than a hardback or paperback book, as it can be done with one hand. It weighs about the same as an average length paperback, and has convenient switches on each side for “next page.”

The screen itself is light gray with black text, and easy on the eyes. Before I realized it, I was in Chapter Two of “The Scarpetta Factor.” I made myself stop, because these are the books I intend to read when I go to Mexico next weekend. Purchasing the Kindle for travel was the whole point. The printed books I hauled to Halibut Cove weighed more than my clothing, and probably half the weight of the two week supply of food.

Impressions so far—great for travel. I don’t think I’d want my reference books on it, although it does come with “The New Oxford American Dictionary” already on it. The Kindle also has the capability of downloading documents from my computer, which might come in handy. There are some drawbacks (you have to loan your whole Kindle if you want to loan your best bud a book), and I'm still getting used to what I think is a sometimes slow navigation, but that might improve as I become more "instructed."

All in all, I think I really like it. And I LOVE the packaging. The packaging itself is a work of art, and shows that someone really, really cares.

(Note: I don’t usually do product endorsements here, but this is different. This post is for my fellow travelers, the ones whose suitcases are half full of books, and still trying to stay under domestic luggage weight limits.)