I'm Kindling

I bought a Kindle from Amazon a couple of weeks ago and it is fantastic. Reading has become more difficult for me over the last couple of years, partly due to the optic nerve damage and nystagmus from my MS. I have a hard time tracking words on a page, especially when I'm tired, so often I have to re-read passages to get everything. I've started so many books in the last couple of years and not finished them because it was becoming so frustrating and difficult to read.

Sam and I had been thinking about picking up large print books but that just seemed depressing. And there wasn't a good selection of books from which to choose.

When the Amazon debuted the Kindle in November 2007 I was intrigued. I added it to my Amazon Wish List and took it off a couple of times over the last year. It seemed like a lot of coin to pay for an ebook reader and I wasn't sure if it would help. Well, I took the plunge a couple of weeks ago with the help of a $50 coupon and a couple of gift cards and I'm back to the books.

Some of the great Kindle features are the variable text size options, built in dictionary that you can access from the page you're reading, built in web browser and access to Wikipedia, and an MP3 player so you can listen to music on headphones while you're reading. The books are delivered wirelessly to your Kindle within a minute of ordering them from Amazon's website or the Kindle store on the Kindle. If you have Word, text, jpeg, tiff, gif, or PDF files you would like to view on your Kindle you can email them to Amazon and they will format them for the Kindle and send them to your device. How cool is that?

One of the best features is being able to download the first chapter of any book so you can see if you like it. There's something nice about being able to thumb through a book in a bookstore and being able to read the first chapter of a book is a pretty good substitute.

There are several online sources of free ebooks and you can download those to your PC/Mac and transfer them to the Kindle via USB connection. I've found alot of the classics on Feedbooks.com and now have dozens of free books on my Kindle. The Kindle holds about 200 books so I'm fine for now but if I start to run out of space I can insert an SD card to add storage.

There are dozens of newspapers and magazines that you can subscribe to for regular delivery or individual issue download. I'm enjoying a two week free trial of the New York Times delivered every morning. I'm not sure if I'll keep it but I may download the Sunday edition if we don't pick up a paper copy.

The Kindle screen is easy to look at for long periods of time. I've spent a few hours reading several times over the last two weeks and haven't experienced any eye fatigue or headaches. Yea! I'm about halfway through The Story of Edgar Sawtelle and am thoroughly enjoying my reading time.

I'll post an update on my Kindle use in a month or two. So far it's love at first Kindle.