Book Talk: Bookstores vs. Amazon and other online retailers (and the importance of bookstores)

Reading the Bookshop Book by Jen Campbell brought a feeling of warmth and joy but at the same time made me think (again) of all the bookstores out there that they are either closed or they are struggling with sales. Despite the fact that bookstores can actually organize amazing events and host author signings , people still choose to shop online (including myself) rather on said bookstore.

Bookstores were always fascinating to me and I bet to a lot of people as well, they are quiet and promise you the discovery of a great adventure. I worked in a famous bookstore in the States and I had customers from every walks of life coming in the store looking for their next favorite book. As booksellers we did everything possible to sell a book or recommend something new to the customer but despite our efforts and love for books in the end around 60% of the customers decided to buy the books online. It was funny how we dreaded the moment the customer would look at the price in the back and how we would wince. I had a good discount on books working there but I never bought anything from the store and I chose Amazon because of the better prices (yes even with the discount that I had, Amazon was still cheaper).

Moving in England around a month ago, I came to realize that British do it differently. Books here ARE cheaper than in the U.S. and they have exactly the same price as Amazon.co.uk . I think that within this month I bought 30 books (planning a post on that) and it was pretty cheap. I love how bookstores here have great promos like buy one get one half price and seem to antagonize online retailers. People actually shop in store rather online. I understand that America is a vast country and you need a car to go everywhere and the taxes aren't helping either so people prefer to shop online but that needs to change and I plan to change that bad habit myself.

Brick and mortal bookstores are needed. Kids discover great books in there, they go on adventures and lets face it is a lot better to actually browse the books on the shelf rather on a screen. Booksellers and other shoppers can give you recommendations and you can actually feel and even smell the books as you open them to discover whats in there. You can't read the entire book or just open it on a random page online, can you?

So, one of my challenges for 2015 (sneak peak everyone) is to read as many paperbacks as possible and all bought from my local Bookstore.

Book Talk: Compulsive Buying

 So, Compulsive Buying Of Books.

 Here is the thing, I think we all in one moment or other browsed through a bookstore searching for some good book to read. Then we see a book with a beautiful cover and an inteeresting sypnosis. We go ahead and buy it. Till this moment- We have the "normal" way to buy books. 

But then it turns out this book is part of a series. Now there are a few options. 

This is where compulsive buying comes in, You see- most times whether I read the book or not I will probably buy all the books in the series. Only for someday read the first book or the second book and realize that I do not love this series and I really do wish I didn't buy it. 

Another option is that I will read the first book and love it and I will buy the other books in the series, just so that one of them in some point will disappoint me and I'll feel like I just wasted my money buying a series of 7 books when at least 3 of them I have no intention to read whatsoever. 

Of course, sometimes you actually do end up liking or even loving the series. Still, I'd say this is about 30% of the cases for me. 

Another aweful thing I do sometimes is buying all the books by the same author just because I read one book and loved it, Sometimes I do find an author to love. Other times I find I wasted money. 

And I wonder.....How can I deal with this problem? 

Right now I try my best to be more careful and buy the other books in the series one at a time. It doesn't always work. 

There are also thos times when I read the sypnosis and I know with great conviction that I'm going to love this book (sometimes I'm wrong), there are also the times when I buy a book and I feel uncertain. Then I do not buy the other books in the series. 

What about you? 

Book Talk: To Be Read Listing Chaos

From the first book an avid reader holds to the very last he will read he pretty much follows a list...or not.

I had a huge tbr list a little while ago, that listed more than 400 books. Yes, that is pretty much on the amount of books that I have already read all these years.

The thing is to actually read those books which, for me, it's insurmountable. The problem is that a lot of new books come out, the one after the other and I want to read all of them, or at least most of them. The thing is that I read slowly because I don;t have a lot of time to do so, so the list continues to accumulate books.

I realized that from the books that I had on the list, the past two years, I only read 16 out of 400 and then I decided to cut it down...a lot.  I started looking up the books on goodreads and at the same time crossing items out of the list. I found myself wondering how some books came to be in the list, or how could I be interested in a book like the particular one I was looking at at the time. My taste has changed dramatically from what I used to read when I started the list.

Right now, on my list consists of only 50 books, some of which I am currently reading and for the future I will try to stick to it as much as possible.

Did you ever have a similar problem with your reading list? Leave a comment below.

Book Talk: When My Currently Reading Shelf Is Out Of Control

In the last few months something scary happened. More than that I returned to old habits. Bad habits I tried to leave behind me a few years ago.

If I may add I think I did a pretty decent job until recently.
So what exactly is that horrible thing? Well.

Do you know those people who read a couple of books at the same time? For the longest time I used to be one of them. With the ability to read more than five books at the same time without getting confused between them. 

Then I decided to control the reading habit. I started limiting myself to 1-2 books each time. 

However, the last couple of months had been rough, So rough I found it hard to concentrate and immerse myself in one book. Which led to me reading many books at the same time. My "currently reading" shelf stands on about 13-16 books right now. It's scary as hell. Most I begin than pt asice and pick up again a few weeks after. 

However, I can't stop picking up new books. Sometimes I'm lucky enough to read finish one of those books in a normal amount of time (between a day or a couple of weeks). But there are book I've been reading for MONTHS. 

What about you? 

Book Talk: Desperation In The Time Of Fan Fiction

There was a time, that when I heard the phrase fan fiction in my mind I used to picture those weird doujinshi* mangas. In the coming years after Twilight (2005 and on), what came to my mind was, of course, the word Twilight, sparkly vampires, the idea of the most perfectly mysterious boyfriend out there and of course honey dripping romance. And I am wondering what the hell happened to modern literature.

We all know Twilight! Most of us read the books in a few hours since we opened them, most of us read them more times than we want to admit and of course, hated/loved equally as much. Let's face it then, I was a teenager when Twilight came out and everyone went crazy about it. It was one of the reasons I started reading Paranormal books and at the time I was mesmerized because I had never ever read something as awesome as Twilight (back then at least). It was the beginning of my reading journey and exploration of different genres, until I noticed it: (drumroll please) 70% of the books I was reading or wanted to read felt and read like Twilight.

Emotions, scenes, plot direction, everything felt like the monster Stephanie Meyer created. Initially, I was excited, I mean the series where my personal fave and I loved what I was reading, but after a while it got boring and stupid. I felt like I was being cheated, especially when more books came out (Hush,Hush , Vampire Academy, The Mortal Instruments) although, each of these series where different than Twilight (characters, plot etc) it felt to me that all of them circled the same notion: Forbidden Love, The Art Of Meeting Someone Completely Different Than You and (yes!) How To Conquer Him, Danger?Who Cares I;m All For It. And my personal favorite: Depressed Boyfriends. Emo suddenly became sexy as hell but without the piercings and black eyes. And then it happened!

Fifty Shades Of Grey released and everyone lost their minds. And I had it. It was Twilight itself without the sparkly vamps but with a whole lot more sex. I love reading books. Its one thing I always did and will probably continue to do, but lately I feel like I have been reading the same stories over and over again but the writing is kind of different. Feels like the rivers of Fantasyland have gone dry and authors from all walks of life try to just copy paste each other. It is unnerving. Okay, I am not saying that there are not people out there that write original plots and stories, I am speaking generally. Because, it is not only about Twilight, the same applies to The Hunger Games which got its inspiration from Battle Royale and then from those two hybrids like Divergent and Legend came out, adapted (naturally) into movies and everyone is going berzeck for them without actually seeing the similarities. I pretty much think it may be copyright infringement as well.

It is such shame that we live in a world where pretty much everything from the last 40 years are being mixed and re-consumed over and over again and right now Im not only speaking about books but also about music. If the present shows signs of decadence and lack of fantasy, I wonder what the future will bring.

*A Japanese word meaning a work published by a specific interest group for other members of that interest group. Doujinshi usually refers to fan made mangaor soft. Because of the copyright laws in Japan fans can get away with making and selling doujinshi featuring their favorite characters from animeand video games although doujinshi also often times feature original characters and stories. A common misunderstanding is that all doujinshi are x-rated fan works but this is not always the case.

You can comment freely below with your opinion on this matter or just vent or anything.

Thanx

Book Talk: What Do I look for in a MC of a Book?

I could talk all day on the various MCs there are in books. However, fact is that while I do not need to relate to the MC or even a side character in order to love or enjoy a book I do need to understand how the MC works and feel some respect to the MC.

Better yet if I feel love the MC.

So what do I look for in a MC?

It's complicated, but I will try to narrow it down. While I have never appreciated, respected or liked an MC that was weak, needy and TSTL I do not need the MC to be strong, special or remarkable.

I just need the MC to be somewhat human.

It's true that the MCs I end up loving are strong-willed, kind, smart, snarky and with some edge. I love it when a character learns and evolves through the book/series. When the character learn from mistakes and gets hurt sometimes. When the logic can be explained and what can't be explained fits with human basics behavior.

As for my favorites characters and why. Maybe that will be in another book talk....or a list.

Anyhow. How do you like your MC?

Book Talk: How Ereaders Changed Me

Since I was a little kid, I have been mesmerized by books. All kinds of books, tall, short, thick, thin, broken spines and intact spines, from white smooth pages to old yellowish and old pages. The covers, the titles, the fonts everything is a new world waiting to be explored by me. Sometimes, I love to look at my bookcase, the different sizes and colors of the books seem like a picture out of a coffee table book. These, are books that I bought three years ago, five, some more than 10 years ago and then there are books that I bought recently but I don't see the ones that I read yesterday or the day before or last week. Why? Because, these books exist in my virtual library on my kindle, pc, nook, laptop, smartphone anywhere else but on my bookcase. And now I wonder: How did this happen?

Until 2013, I did not have an e-reader. I lived in Greece, we don't have amazon or Barnes and Noble there and we don't have the e-reader technology ,although, Europe is filled with it. I was always browsing on Amazon.com things that I wanted to buy one day or had my then boyfriend order for me since his family ordered quite often from the online superstore. I remember the ads of the new Kindle (I think it was kindle 4 at the time? Not so sure) but I never thought I needed it. Besides, I was reading actual books everyday, I had the library next to my house and I could go there whenever I wanted. I was ok with actual, paperback and hardback books.

At night, I would turn on my light and read until dawn if I wanted to. I would throw it in my school bag and read at school, I could take the book anywhere with me. That changed when I moved in the U.S. in the beginning of 2013. I was seeing ereaders everywhere. I went to Barnes and Noble and they were there in different versions, promising customizable text fonts and sizes, line margins, fast page turning, built in light and many many more. I was intrigued. So, I said ''why not'' and bought one – and it changed my reading experience completely, the Nook Simple Touch also changed the way I see actual books.

The first three months, I was only reading from my nook. I did not touch a book. The nook did not have a built in light but I was fine with it, I had my table lamp. I felt like I read faster than before, I could look up words I didn't know without even opening a dictionary or my computer and I could keep notes. It was just magic to me. I was in love. After those first months, I started mixing ebooks with actual ones and kept some kind of balance. Up to 7 months later when I started the blog. I felt, like I was switching to my nook completely. I did not buy a lot of new books, only used from Thriftbooks and Goodwill because I was more accustomed to the cost of an ebook. I was thinking ''Why would I spend 10 or 20 or 50 dollars on a book when I can either get it half price on my nook or used or even free from the library?'' I don't know how much does it benefit the authors and the publishers if you buy ebooks but I am pretty sure a lot of people think exactly like this today. And it is not good.

Recently, I switched to a KindlePaperwhite and I rarely read actual books. It's like they dont meet my expectations – after all they don't have built in light, they don't monitor my time or how much time is left in the chapter, they don't have a built in dictionary or I am not able to change fonts. Most of them are not light, or take too much space in my bag etc. And this is crazy. I never thought, that an ereader would do this to me. Would make me see the actual books redundant and not worthy to even touch. If I knew it, I would simply never buy an ereader.

I am planning to change that soon. I am trying to read more books again. I will at least try to put my kindle aside for awhile and rekindle with my actual books. Buy more actual books, go to the bookstore again and even visit the library.

E-readers may be the future of books but books have been around forever in all kinds of forms – stone, wood, paper ,e-ink-digital- and they will continue to be around for a long time to come but no matter in what form they are available we should never forget the enthusiasm we felt as kids when we were buying a new book. I'm sure all of us stuck our noses in there and inhaled the scent. That beautiful scent of a new book or an old one. Besides, every bookcase makes a house even more beautiful and shows that a person is indeed cultivated what does the e-reader show?

If you went or going through something

similar or want to post your opinion on this feel free to comment below!

Ciao.

Book Talk: Periods of Compulsive Reading (Disorder)

Reading is in my everyday routine, I cant even imagine my day without reading not even a paragraph of a book or an article or another blogger's review. It's crazy but then again there are millions of people who think and do what I do. Read. But then again that can happen with consistency for a period of time and then suddenly and unexpectedly stop.

Sometimes I experience weeks and months of reading non stop. I can even read a book in a day if I am really in the mood or the book is really good for that matter. I will write reviews, I will search for more books to read and so on. Then one day I will just wake up and I wont pick up a new book or continue the one I would be reading at the moment. I will go like that for weeks maybe months. It happened before and I am pretty sure it will happen again and that only happens with books.

It feels like I am suddenly lacking the interest and the ''right mood'' to pick up any book. It's like I totally forget what I like about reading. Why I am reading books and its taunting. During my seasonal-book-depression (that's how I call it), I fall behind when it comes to new releases,my challenges etc and that pretty much sucks afterwards when I am back to reading books on full speed.

Does anything like this happen to you? Do you experience times of unstoppable reading just to find yourself one day with a seasonal book depression? Leave a comment below with your own experience on that matter!!!

Book Talk: Hunting For The Next Great Read

So, you finished the book you were reading and went through all the stages of the post reading disorder. Laughter, obsession, over thinking, opening the book and reading favorite pages and quotes. And now, you just sit there in your bed, chair, floor, couch, lawn and feel empty inside because you simply dont know what to read next. You start new books and you stop thinking ,no, that's not it. Or maybe you did find your next great read and you are happily reading it. How the heck did you do it?

You see, once I finish a book, I can;t find one that I want to read now. I feel like I don't know what I want it to be...the genre. Do I want action, romance, sci-fi, ya, erotica, historical fiction? I simply don't know. I open books and books and read the first couple of pages and then I just put it back on my shelf because its not the one. Goodreads makes things worse. Maybe I am over thinking it, or maybe I am still a little fazed by the book I read a couple of days ago that I am not ready to move on (like I had a relationship or something haha).

Does any of you have the same issue? Do you find your next great read easily or struggle through hell and back??? 

Efterpi