Yet others will say, \u201cBut I love the feel\/look\/smell of a book in my hands, on the shelf and in a book store.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Personally, I\u2019ve been collecting books for years. When we bought our current home, it had both a family room and \u201cformal\u201d living room. I was excited because I knew immediately that my formal living room would be the library and it would house the hundreds of books that I own, in addition to almost 1,000 music CD\u2019s. However, those shelves filled up so fast, they started to spread. There are books behind the books on the shelves, on top of books and in piles on surfaces everywhere. It takes forever to dust them and sometimes I can\u2019t even find what I\u2019m looking for because aside from keeping Sue Grafton\u2019s Alphabet Series in order, and all of Stephen King\u2019s books together, everything has to fit by shelf height. \u00a0I tried making a master list, but things get moved so often to make room for more, I gave up.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Love of Digital<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/landscape3.jpg\")
<\/a>I got a Kindle for my birthday a few years ago. I hated it. It wasn\u2019t a \u201cbook.\u201d I had issues with the charger so I blamed it all on the fact it was a device. Then we got it worked out and someone sent me to this site where you could get FREE e-books. Gee, free is free and sometimes it\u2019s awesome to have a couple of mindless romances while I\u2019m at the pool with the kids without lugging a bunch of books. Except one or two free books turned into dozens of free books.
\nA book lover in Atlanta recently told me that she prefers print books, but free e-books are a great way to try out a new author, and she was completely right. I\u2019ve discovered dozens of new authors that I never would have paid $7.99 for at Barnes & Noble. Which leads to the discussion of price. Although it may not apply to top authors like Janet Evanovich or James Patterson, for the most part, e-books are cheaper. There are no printing or shipping costs, and I\u2019ve never paid sales tax either. It\u2019s rare to pay more than $6.99 for a typical e-book and once you\u2019ve been sucked in to a series by reading a free copy of Book One, there is no way you\u2019re not going to pay $3.99 for Book Two if you liked it.
\nMy physical library is stuffed to the gills. I will continue to buy a hard cover copy of all the Sue Grafton books until she\u2019s done because it would look ridiculous if I stopped at \u201cW,\u201d plus I like my collection. I own the entire Mrs. Pollifax series, by Dorothy Gilman, and I read them from start to finish once a year or so. The same goes for Janet Evanovich\u2019s Stephanie Plum Series and every Stephen King book ever made. We\u2019ve got the Harry Potter collection, a handful of books signed by their authors and lots of classics, but the mindless romances and the \u201cread it once and never thought about it again\u201d books are all gone now. The shelves are still overflowing but they are just my favorites and will now only be filled with special books and collector\u2019s items.
\nEverything else (and now I have over 500) will live in digital utopia. My shelves are prettier, though they are still full and hard to dust, and since I continue to buy (just more slowly), I\u2019m going to need more room eventually. But now I can take 500+ books on a two week vacation, instead of lugging two or three and praying I don\u2019t finish them before the flight is over.
\n <\/p>\nThe Love of Print<\/h2>\n
<\/a>For those who refuse to go digital, I get it. I really do. There is something about holding that book in your hands and smelling the print, wandering around book stores randomly taking things off the shelves to look at, and then leaving the store with a bag full of something tangible. E-books are, in some ways, not real. You push a button or two, and then it\u2019s on your device. Easy? Yes. Fun? Not as much.
\nThere\u2019s something kind of depressing about giving someone a book they want in the form of a piece of paper with a code on it. Yes, it\u2019s still the book, but it\u2019s such a let-down from the excitement of ripping open the wrapping paper and having an item in your hands. There\u2019s also something comforting about wandering into a book store and looking lovingly at every book on the shelf, even if you haven\u2019t read it. Plus you can just grab one and flip through the pages.
\nThere are so many books on my Kindle I have to scroll forever to see what\u2019s there if I don\u2019t remember the name, and I don\u2019t always remember if I liked it or not. It\u2019s not as easy to flip through pages on an e-reader as it is to flip through a regular book if I\u2019m looking for a specific passage or scene. It\u2019s just not the same, no matter how awesome it is to carry a thousand books in something that weighs 8 ounces.
\n <\/p>\nAnd The Winner Is\u2026<\/h2>\n