I have been neglecting this review for quite some time. I promise I have reasons for doing so. The most important reason is that I have been waiting for the battery to die.

The Kindle advertises a battery life of around a month. I got my Kindle on May 28th (as an epic birthday present!). I ran the battery to the very end of its life without charging it (but it charges when you plug it into the computer, so it charged when I put new books on it). There are a few factors here as well: First, the battery is drains faster if the wireless is turned on. Second, my case (which I love!!), if I don’t put the Kindle to sleep, sometimes presses buttons. So, I would wake it up and find that the wireless was on. With all of these things taken into account, my battery officially died on June 14th. It didn’t quite last me a month, but I probably use mine more than most people use theirs. I have read 10 or so books… I haven’t reviewed them all so I have no way of keeping track of how many books I’ve read. I know I’m forgetting one or two, but 10 is a safe number. Part of that battery consumption is also because I love arranging my books in ways that make sense probably only to me. That being said, the Collections function on the Kindle is my new best friend. Stephen King has his own Collection, and right now there are 24 books in it.

Here is my Kindle list/review:

Things I love about my Kindle:

• I love how small it is. I have the 6” one, and it is the perfect size. 
• I love that you can flip the page by pushing buttons on either side of the Kindle. It makes it a whole lot easier if I’m attempting to multi-task.
• I love how many books it can hold. I think mine has somewhere near 80 on it right now with plenty more space available.
• I love that I can bookmark, highlight, and add notes. I like doing that in some books, but generally consider it a sin to write in books… especially ones that aren’t mine. On the Kindle, I can always remove the notes if I want to. 
• The Kindle has an experimental function that allows you to browse the interwebs. It’s… different. I don’t know that I would ever reach the point where I need to use it, but it’s nice for one reason. There are a few sites out there that offer free books that Amazon might not offer for such a competitive rate. I can just use the Kindle browser to download the books directly onto my Kindle. That’s actually how I got my mythology books. They have pictures and are awesome. 
• It has the same charger that my Droid (phone… not like R2D2) uses, so I only need one cord. Win!

Things I’m not so keen on:

• I’ve already scratched the screen… it’s minor, and I think it happened before I had my case. 
• There is this weird glare. It’s not bad, I can totally read the Kindle in full sunlight, but it has a glare like a magazine page would. 
• Along the lines of the glare, there is no backlight (which is good for battery). You can use one of those little clip-on reading lights, but it’s really hard to avoid glare with them. 
• The keyboard is tricky. For some reason, whenever I try to press the “n” button I end up hitting the “m” button. This could totally be an "ID10-T" error, but I like to blame the Kindle.

My overall review:

I love my Kindle. I love it a little too much. I was totally the person who refused to like Kindles. I love the smell of old books, I love the tactile feel of the pages, and I love the act of turning the page of a page turner. I was stubborn. Then I tried one out. It is nothing short of an addiction. I have read significantly more books than I would have if I had only books. First of all, having that many books would make my traveling around quite difficult. Secondly, the percentage bar at the bottom of the screen while reading is like a personal challenge. 80% complete? I can totally finish this right now! 

So, would I recommend a Kindle to others? Most definitely, wholeheartedly, undoubtedly. Not only would I, but I do, regularly and animatedly. I love my Kindle. It’s not perfect, but nothing is. It’s getting closer though. 

At the request of my adoring fans, I read Kurt Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse-Five". I've been told numerous times that I needed to read some Vonnegut, so I figured I would start with the most popular.

Let me just say, I was not looking forward to reading this book. I knew I should, and I love getting recommendations on what to read. I just was super reluctant to read this. As I started the book, Vonnegut's abstract writing threw me for a loop. It did not endear me to him. By the time I got to the story of Billy Pilgrim, I was ready to just stop reading, but my stubbornness got the better of me. Once I started reading about the man who was unstuck in time, I couldn't put my Kindle down. I was totally enthralled. The abstract writing started to come together, and the story was so original. I was wholly surprised. 

Like usual, it's time for the lists.

What I liked about this book:

• I love how Vonnegut tells the war stories of Billy Pilgrim. 
• Billy Pilgrim is quickly becoming one of my favorite literary characters, and I'm not really sure why. 
• I like how Vonnegut plays with the concepts of fate and time. 

What I did not like about this book:

• I didn't like the beginning part. I still don't really see the value of it. If someone would impart their opinion on the matter, I would be happy to hear it.
• I didn't like the unanswered questions. Montana Wildhack? What happened to her? What happened to the child?
• As much as I liked the concept of being unstuck in time, I didn't really enjoy the flashes to the different times in his life. I understand why there were there, but I liked the war part the best. 

I definitely thought about this book when I wasn't reading it, which means that it's a good book in my world. I will definitely read another of Vonnegut's books, and I would recommend this book to certain others. I wouldn't say this is a book that everyone should read, but I liked it. 

I know that I said I would read "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" next... I am reading it, I promise. Let me tell you a brief little story first. 

I got a Kindle for my birthday, and I have previously mentioned my slight addiction to the device... well, nothing has changed. I love my Kindle. Addiction is the proper word. So, I have all these books on my Kindle and I wanted to read one. I chose a short one so I could justify finishing a book in a day or two before jumping back into P&P&Z. I remember when "Ur" came out, it was released only for the Kindle... and it was by Stephen King. Of course I had to check it out. 

Let me tell you a little bit about this book without giving too much away:
The idea is that an English professor gets called out for being behind the times and still loving books (with good reason! Books rock... but so does the Kindle). So, he buys a Kindle and, before they had different color Kindles, receives a pink one in the mail. There is a special setting in the Kindle that allows him to read books written by authors in parallel dimensions. So, in our little dimension, Ernest Hemingway died in 1961. In a different Ur, he may have died in 1964. During those extra years, he wrote other books. The English professor, Wesley, now has access to all the books that could have been written. Ur Local, Wesley discovers, allows him to read his local newspaper... but only future editions. Of course there are Paradox Laws that have to be followed. I mean, there are laws for everything these days. I will let you read this for yourself to find out what happens.

Now, let me tell you what I liked about this book:

• Stephen King just has the most original way with words. Each time I read one of his books, I am pleasantly surprised. 
• I love how he ties in things from his other books. Does he have a book that doesn't reference another in some way? I really don't know. I would have to read them all twice to make an educated guess. 
• It was short and fairly direct but still engaging.
• Speaking of the way he writes, I loved this sentence so much: "They moved to the door, the hems of their coats making loathsome liquid chuckling sounds." So awesome. 

What I didn't like about this book:

• It was a shameless advertisement for the Kindle. 
• There was one part in particular where he basically writes a mini instruction manual for the Kindle. 
• I feel that the Kindle plugging was just so ridiculous that it should be mentioned twice. I brushed it off as amusing, but I can see how it would get annoying fast. 

 So, those are my thoughts. I really enjoyed this book and was reminded how much I love Stephen King. I would recommend reading it if you have a Kindle because I don't think you can get it elsewhere. 

I recently gained access to a Kindle. I have been very anti-kindle in the past because I just love books so much. I will review the Kindle in a following post, but let me just sum up my thoughts on the kindle in one word: Addiction. I’m a little ashamed to admit it, but I am totally addicted. There were 53 books on the Kindle that I managed to get my hands on, and I chose a book that interested me, that I had read before, and that I knew I enjoyed. If you haven’t figured it out by the title of this post, it’s “The Lost World” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. You may know Sir Arthur Conan Doyle for his Sherlock Holmes stories, but let me tell you, “The Lost World” is definitely worth the read.

I had remembered the basic concept from when I had previously read it, but had forgotten a good portion of it. Honestly, the last time I read it was in middle school. As I normally do with books I read, I’m going to tell you what I liked about it and what I didn’t like about it. Before I lose you, I’m going to sum up the story:

This is an epistolary story (where the story is told in the form of letters… a.k.a. epistles). A fickle woman says she wants to marry a man of adventure, so our main character, Malone, a writer for a newspaper, decides he is going to become a man of adventure. He encounters Professor Challenger, gets a black eye, and volunteers to go to South America with Challenger in search of pterodactyls. Along for the ride are two others: an outdoorsy hunter type named Jon Roxton and a professor, Summerlee, who wants to prove Challenger a fool. Off they go into the Amazon. Let me be brief: anthropoid apes, betrayal, dinosaurs, poison darts, volcano, dinosaurs, no escape, prisoners, marshes, dinosaurs etc. They return to London with an insane sounding story. I won’t tell you the end though, because I like it a lot and I want you to read it.

Now, onto the things I liked and disliked. Let’s start with the positive.

What I liked about “The Lost World”:

• Dinosaurs
  
• I love the camaraderie between the four men who go adventuring. 
• I love Gladys’ choice at the end
• I love Challenger and his wife
• Dinosaurs
• When things happened in this book, I was all attention. I may not know much about the iguanadon, but by George, I was enthralled!
• I’m fascinated by what the people of the early 1900’s thought about this book. Did they think it was real? I mean… is it real?
• It’s interesting to see how ideas and perceptions have changed since this book came out. A good anthropological study.
• Did I mention dinosaurs?

What I disliked about “The Lost World”:

• Everybody seemed so optimistic all the time. Just once, I wanted someone to have a total breakdown. There were some definite points that came close, but they just did not quite get there. 
• Anthropoid apes. It’s not that I have a problem with them from a literary point of view, I just don’t like them. Then again, you’re not supposed to like them. To quote an awesome movie, “Get your stinking paws off me, you damned, dirty ape!” [Planet of the Apes, 1968]
• The story took a little longer to start than I wanted it to. 
• There was no sequel, though the ending totally sets it up for one.

Before I become too long winded, I can safely say that the good of this book clearly outweighs the bad. I love the way SACD writes, and would recommend any of his books to you. Like a good mystery? Check out Sherlock Holmes. Like dinosaurs? Welcome to the club… and read “The Lost World”.