If you haven’t begun reading ebooks more than or as well as books then the question of “Why do books in print still captivate readers above ebooks?” is a mute point. For those of us who relish the immediacy of epublishing – the exciting ability for anyone to get published and the indulgence of click/pay/read – it does become a question you ask yourself.
This was no more so for me in the past week when copies of books that I edited and published arrived by mail. Old fashioned print books that I could hold, feel the air rush past my face as I fanned through the pages, touch the author’s names on the cover and and actually hold the physical book I helped create. It was joyous; I was proud. But the fact is, each of these books had been available for months as ebooks and my reaction to seeing them hit the browsing line on Amazon Kindle was nowhere near as strong. With the reality that the majority of sales for these titles will be as ebooks and not in print, why is this so? And will I ever let go of my admiration of the printed word?
I have no answers to this one, except to say that old habits die hard and books on shelves are like stamps saying “look what I’ve done”. Maybe it’s because my parents are both academic bookworms with floor to ceiling displays of book spines, proudly declaring their love of the printed word – and the child within me wants to show them, “Look what I did.”
Whatever the reason, being able to offer clients the option of getting their books in print is very satisfying.
Do you hold onto the adoration of books in print too – even though you can see the great benefits of epublishing?
