Q: If you were kitting out a holiday cottage (vacation rental) what would you put on the bookshelf for rainy days?

A: My new E-reader.

When I ask people if they read books on e-readers, their reaction is pretty clear: ugh!

I felt the same to a degree. Another modern convenience that seems to speed up and depersonalize life. You can’t feel where you are in the book (beginning, middle, end), you can’t commune with the author quite so well, and so on… There’s also remuneration; does the author get as much for an e-book as a hard copy? I’m not clear on the economics, but I’m sure it’s considerably less.

On the other hand, maybe ten people who wouldn’t have been able or willing to spend the money on that author’s hard copy will take a chance with the more affordable e-book, which brings the added value of  more readers.

Having an e-reader myself for a couple of months, I don’t find it as loathsome as I expected. I think accepting the e-book into my heart is key. I can still commune with the author – it’s the words, not the paper after all, though books are beautiful as objects. With my e-reader, the type gets larger as my eyes get tired — no more #@*$ reading glasses! It’s got a velvety case which is nice to the touch, and in the night its screen is like a little glow-worm. This coming winter I won’t freeze my hands trying to hold a paperback open in bed — I don’t know how many times a book has dropped on my face, knocking my reading glasses askew and losing my place — but instead will just reach out a finger now and then and flick to the next page.

Also I don’t have to find space on my many, many overcrowded bookshelves. And I can make notes, too, right on the page, which is coming in handier than I thought. Yes, with a paperback I could take notes on a separate notepad, but will I? Like reading instruction manuals — no.

There are more benefits. When I head off to my holiday cottage I can pack light, yet stock the shelves with all my past, current, and future reading thrills, AND have room left for a whiskey decanter and a couple of glasses.

For sentimental reasons I might take a few musty, dog-eared Ed McBains though.

Back to the real question, what will I read in my getaway cabin? Lots of Nordic crime! I haven’t really explored this niche until assigned to moderate a panel at the upcoming Bouchercon called “Northern Crimes”, and I thought OMG, I better start reading, fast. I’m not a fast reader, but I’m now on the fifth of the five panelists, and they’re all so excellent.

I’m reading
Kelley Armstrong (Canada)
Caro Ramsay (Scotland)
Antti Tuomainen (Finland)
Alex Gray (Scotland)
Ragnar Jonasson (Iceland).

For some reason, I seem to identify with books in which the weather is miserable — dreich in fact — and the landscape forbidding. Maybe being born in Britain did it.

Anyway, I’m happy to report I love these writers’ work and look forward to meeting and talking with them in person. There are so many other books out there to read that it’s daunting, but I feel like this moderating challenge has got me out of my reading comfort zone (aka rut), and I’m glad of that.

If you’re at Bouchercon in Toronto on October 14 at 1 pm, I hope you can attend. Let’s talk books!