Reading - books or ereader (other kindles are available)!

[Reynard]

He was great at creating characters to be fair.

Yes, definitely. I think that was his strength, as he was a very good and astute observer of the world around him. Especially since the underlying theme for most of his novels is highlighting the social injustices of the time.

 

[annedonnelly]

Another fan of Sherlock Holmes here. If you don't enjoy reading them there are loads of radio versions available. There are usually a few audiobook versions on Borrowbox.

 

[KnittyNorah]

Anyone want Sherlock Holmes audiodramas, I've got archive.org links I'm happy to share. Stream them or download, your choice. Just say.

ETA 74 bbc audiodramas, mainly dramatised by Bert Coules.

 

[Reynard]

Sort of on a tangent, the Sherlock Holmes-themed episodes in Star Trek - The Next Generation are always a good watch.

 

[Legs]

I love my Kindle for bedtime and holidays, but I love the convenience of being able to whip my iPhone out and read on the Kindle app when I don't have my Kindle with me. About half of the time I'll be reading something by Stephen King - I think he's unfairly pigeonholed as a 'horror writer'; some of his better novels have little or no supernatural element.

I gave Jo her first Kindle 11 years ago. Ironically, we've bought FAR more dead-tree-format books, since then because our now-8yo is an avid bookworm (and an unbelievably fast reader.) I'll wait until he's 9 before I give him It.

 

[Poacher]

I love Sherlock Holmes and have read them all at least once. The hound of the Baskervilles is probably one of the greatest novels ever written. The sign of four is good too. The short stories vary but the early ones are generally excellent. I'd say it's definitely worth your while to give Holmes a go.

I was about 12 when I first read Conan Doyle's The Adventure of the Priory School and immediately spotted his fallacious cycle "evidence".

“This track, as you perceive, was made by a rider who was going from the direction of the school.”
“Or towards it?”
“No, no, my dear Watson. The more deeply sunk impression is, of course, the hind wheel, upon which the weight rests. You perceive several places where it has passed across and obliterated the more shallow mark of the front one. It was undoubtedly heading away from the school.”

That's right; the infallible Holmes had merely established that a ridden bicycle moves forward. The whole case rested on this!

 

[Time Waster]

I love my Kindle for bedtime and holidays, but I love the convenience of being able to whip my iPhone out and read on the Kindle app when I don't have my Kindle with me. About half of the time I'll be reading something by Stephen King - I think he's unfairly pigeonholed as a 'horror writer'; some of his better novels have little or no supernatural element.

I gave Jo her first Kindle 11 years ago. Ironically, we've bought FAR more dead-tree-format books, since then because our now-8yo is an avid bookworm (and an unbelievably fast reader.) I'll wait until he's 9 before I give him It.

My partner hates kindles because they're screens and technology. She's set our lad, now 9, a rule about all screens and technology off by 7 or 7:,30. I really think he would suit a kindle as he's an avid reader. He can demolish a book a night if he's in that mood and he's found the right book. Even without that he's 30 minutes to an hour every night reading read all the Harry Potter books before turning 9, half before turning 8. At school he gets the teacher's copy not the class kids version if they're short of copies. Apparently teacher is confident he can read a book with just words and no pictures.

A kindle, imho, would suit him because he could simply get one book after another. Now we have library books, school books and bought books. He often reads things again, even library books we take back every fortnight. Kids can take twice out than adults so he just about lasts 2 weeks with school books.

It's all paying off the effort developing his love of reading. Teachers say he's got very creative writing ideas, very innovative. He's in a class with a year older and they teach a lot at the older age but tailor expectations to their ages. He's getting ideas and concepts the year older are expected to get not his year.

Sorry if this sounds boasting but imho kids get more from reading than adults. It really develops their mind so much more quickly. Verbal, reading, creative writing. It all improves better with a reading life. Damn it! I'm getting that Kindle or other ereader!

 

[annedonnelly]

@Legs and @Time Waster I think it's fantastic that your children are so into reading. Lots of reading must be good for them as they grow and develop.

I was always an avid reader too and I don't think it did me any harm.

 

[Reynard]

My partner hates kindles because they're screens and technology. She's set our lad, now 9, a rule about all screens and technology off by 7 or 7:,30. I really think he would suit a kindle as he's an avid reader. He can demolish a book a night if he's in that mood and he's found the right book. Even without that he's 30 minutes to an hour every night reading read all the Harry Potter books before turning 9, half before turning 8. At school he gets the teacher's copy not the class kids version if they're short of copies. Apparently teacher is confident he can read a book with just words and no pictures.

A kindle, imho, would suit him because he could simply get one book after another. Now we have library books, school books and bought books. He often reads things again, even library books we take back every fortnight. Kids can take twice out than adults so he just about lasts 2 weeks with school books.

It's all paying off the effort developing his love of reading. Teachers say he's got very creative writing ideas, very innovative. He's in a class with a year older and they teach a lot at the older age but tailor expectations to their ages. He's getting ideas and concepts the year older are expected to get not his year.

Sorry if this sounds boasting but imho kids get more from reading than adults. It really develops their mind so much more quickly. Verbal, reading, creative writing. It all improves better with a reading life. Damn it! I'm getting that Kindle or other ereader!

That sounds a lot like me when I was that age... I was an only child, and we didn't have a big social circle, so my parents, mum especially, encouraged me to read. At that age, I was a couple of years ahead of my classmates in terms of what I was reading at home in my free time. Outside of fiction, I also read as much as I could get my hands on about cars and motor racing, as I was motorsport and engineering mad.

Have you thought about encouraging him to write his own stories as a hobby?

Writing is the other side of the coin to reading, IMHO, and it's something I've always loved, because it allowed me to explore my own ideas and interests. I've written as a hobby - poetry, short stories, fan fiction etc as far back as I can remember - as well as writing on a professional level. I find it incredibly satisfying from a personal perspective.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

My partner hates kindles because they're screens and technology. She's set our lad, now 9, a rule about all screens and technology off by 7 or 7:,30. I really think he would suit a kindle as he's an avid reader. He can demolish a book a night if he's in that mood and he's found the right book. Even without that he's 30 minutes to an hour every night reading read all the Harry Potter books before turning 9, half before turning 8. At school he gets the teacher's copy not the class kids version if they're short of copies. Apparently teacher is confident he can read a book with just words and no pictures.

A kindle, imho, would suit him because he could simply get one book after another. Now we have library books, school books and bought books. He often reads things again, even library books we take back every fortnight. Kids can take twice out than adults so he just about lasts 2 weeks with school books.

It's all paying off the effort developing his love of reading. Teachers say he's got very creative writing ideas, very innovative. He's in a class with a year older and they teach a lot at the older age but tailor expectations to their ages. He's getting ideas and concepts the year older are expected to get not his year.

Sorry if this sounds boasting but imho kids get more from reading than adults. It really develops their mind so much more quickly. Verbal, reading, creative writing. It all improves better with a reading life. Damn it! I'm getting that Kindle or other ereader!

Maybe you could point out that a Kindle e.ink screen is fundamentally different to a mobile/computer screen?

 

[presta]

There are books on my shelf that are over 100 years old, and I can still read them. I can't imagine many people will be reading 100 year old E-books any more than listening to 100 year old records, cassettes, & CDs.

 

[Blue Hills]

Writing is the other side of the coin to reading, IMHO, and it's something I've always loved, because it allowed me to explore my own ideas and interests. I've written as a hobby - poetry, short stories, fan fiction etc as far back as I can remember - as well as writing on a professional level. I find it incredibly satisfying from a personal perspective.

by the by, can you give me a simple definition of "fan fiction"?
Have often wondered - i know the shades of grey thing was supposed to have started off as that.
Hopefully you won't tell me to just google

 

[Blue Hills]

There are books on my shelf that are over 100 years old, and I can still read them. I can't imagine many people will be reading 100 year old E-books any more than listening to 100 year old records, cassettes, & CDs.

i don't understand what you are saying here - folks are reading 100 year old ebooks now.*
see above references to project gutenberg etc above.

* How's about The Machine Stops by EM Forster?
So yesterday?
So today?
So tomorrow?

edit - I thought i had got The Machine Stops from gutenberg but a quick search doesn't find it.
I definitely got if for free from somewhere though.
Recommended.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

There are books on my shelf that are over 100 years old, and I can still read them. I can't imagine many people will be reading 100 year old E-books any more than listening to 100 year old records, cassettes, & CDs.

Kindle books are facsimilies of real books. Not sure what your point is.

 

[Reynard]

by the by, can you give me a simple definition of "fan fiction"?
Have often wondered - i know the shades of grey thing was supposed to have started off as that.
Hopefully you won't tell me to just google

Basically, you're playing in someone else's sandbox, when really, you shouldn't be.

Fanfic sits in a grey area in terms of copyright, so it can be frowned upon, and, if using more than a few lines of original text, can also be seen as plagiarism. Which is why most if not all pieces published online will have a disclaimer saying that XYZ belongs to author ABC and you're only borrowing the characters for a little while.

Because of that, fan fiction is strictly not-for-profit, which makes me wonder how 50 Shades got past the safety net.

Some authors and film / TV franchises actively encourage fan fiction (Star Trek in particular, who then ran a competition to get new authors in, and published the best stories in a series of books), whereas others will issue cease & desist orders regardless of how good the quality of the writing is.

I try to avoid most of the common pitfalls in my own fanfics (set in the Babylon 5 universe) by using mainly original characters and writing about events that lie parallel to the main story arc - alluded to in the series, but never touched.

There used to be a fan fiction dictionary on jumpnow.de which was incredibly useful, but the website has been defunct for a fey years now. It might still be available on some archive online somewhere