Rick Riordan's new book: sneak peek chapter

If your Rick Riordan fans who loved Percy Jackson have kept going with the Kane Chronicles (Red Pyramid is out, Throne of Fire is out soon) they may like to get hold of sneak peek of Throne of Fire via Amazon.  At time of writing (these things change, so don't get cranky if the freebie is gone!) you can preorder a Kindle e-book edition of "The Throne of Fire Chapter Sneak Peek" for $0 (not $18.99) and it will be delivered on May 3, 2011. 

You don't need a Kindle e-reader to read it, you can read Kindle-formatted books via iPhone app, on your PC/Mac etc - the page has links to these.

Here's the link!

Great chance to offer your students a freebie by a popular YA author.

Cheers

Ruth

Image source: Amazon, as per link above.

A free sci-fi e-story (still!): Boojum

So this morning I had a conversation with an English teacher who wanted to plug his senior English class into the many science fiction options in our fiction section...

And I remembered as well this blog entry from two years ago:

A while ago I read the anthology of pirate stories, Fast Ships, Black Sails, edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer: they've edited a number of anthologies in the fantasy/steampunk genres, generally pitched at an adult audience (which isn't to say the stories aren't good for kids, but is to say that the anthologies aren't constructed to eliminate that which might not be considered by some suitable for an adolescent audience).


My favourite story in this anthology, without a doubt, was Boojum by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear. Black Alice is a space pirate, not a wet pirate, on a ship that is a creature (a boojum); it's a clever clever tale with a twist. It was one I lent to senior Extension English students to look at as an idea of how a longer short piece of writing might be constructed (since a number of them were writing prose fiction for their major works).

And tootling around on Google in the hols, I discovered that of all the pirate stories in all the world, this one is available online (as described in this blog entry) as an e-story pdf, Hurrah! Click here to read BOOJUM!


It has a couple of bits of contextual coarse language in it, so if that's a concern for you read it first before sharing with kids (read it anyway, just because it's good). It's high school level in its ideas, rather than primary school. But if you're looking for an e-example of a story to share, try this.

Knowing I'd blogged about it here on Skerricks, I went back to the entry and you know what?  The link still works!  So if you didn't read/use it then, or had forgotten about it, here's a reminder of a spiffing story.  You can save a copy of the pdf, too...

Cheers

Ruth

Image source: the story's pdf.

Margaret Atwood on the future of publishing

At the recent Tools of Change conference, author Margaret Atwood spoke on The Publishing Pie: an Author's View.  Agree?  Disagree?  Make up your own mind; you can watch her presentation on YouTube.






Here is the original link on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6iMBf6Ddjk

More of the conference proceedings, some with slideshows/video: click here.

Cheers

Ruth

Found via this blog, which consistently covers a whole lot of interesting links about ereaders, digital books and the future of publishing and books.

Are school libraries nearly obsolete?

Some food for thought in these two blog entries:

• http://www.teleread.com/library/2010-summary-libraries-are-still-screwed-by-eric-hellman/
• http://doug-johnson.squarespace.com/blue-skunk-blog/2010/12/31/2010-the-year-of-the-cloud.html

Cheers (perhaps.  perhaps not) (I would note that there are some perspectives in these that reflect the US reality, rather than the worldwide one eg. in relation to digital rights).

Ruth

Library Day in the Life, Round 6, Tuesday

During the summer holidays (and with an iPhone handy) I've been in the habit of checking my Twitter stream each morning and emailing interesting tweets for later investigation on my laptop (bigger screen...).

So, as a snapshot of what I found this morning that I thought might be useful to my work as a teacher librarian - for me, or my colleagues, or the kids - here's what I emailed for future investigation.  It's a lucky dip depending on what others are tweeting and retweeting, and filtered by the people I follow (my Twitter @ruth_skerricks is my professional Twitter stream, where I follow people tweeting about education, technology, libraries, books...).  The motivational quotes are ideas for the senior study skills program I'm working on, some of the other links may or may not be useful, but it's all a great professional development resource.  I can't access Twitter at work (social networking sites are generally blocked) so if I email myself the links I can investigate them and if they prove useful/relevant to others, email them on to colleagues.

NY Public Library (@nypl)
25/01/11 9:49 AM
From our Tumblr: "We can’t behave like people in novels, though, can we?" http://bit.ly/fq6jmK

Josh Stumpenhorst (@stumpteacher)
25/01/11 9:49 AM
My video tutorial page: http://bit.ly/f5RUbv  #edchat #edtech
 
Fiona Jones (@fionareadersrr)
25/01/11 9:37 AM
RT @Infoventurer: Kathryn Greenhill Daily http://bit.ly/emzftW  ▸ stories today @curtinuni @camcd @fionareadersrr @libsmatter @jeanburgess

Motivational Quotes (@motivatquotes)
25/01/11 9:27 AM
Our attitude towards others determines their attitude towards us. ~ E. Nightingale http://bit.ly/9fOwbe

Shannon Miller (@shannonmmiller)
24/01/11 10:20 PM
RT @pgreensoup Quizlet Flashcards Now Embeddable http://bit.ly/g8TtzG  #vanmeter

Buffy Hamilton (@buffyjhamilton)
24/01/11 10:22 PM
Seth's Blog: Three ways to help people get things done: http://is.gd/kUvITS

Shannon Miller (@shannonmmiller)
24/01/11 10:23 PM
Joliprint ...Print friendly & PDF your blogs and websites http://ow.ly/3IXN0

Glenda Morris (@jasmont1)
24/01/11 10:42 PM
“@glendagregory: Top 10 sites for Creating Digital Magazines and Newspapers by David Kapuler (cont) http://tl.gd/8bq4vj 

Guardian Books (@GuardianBooks)
24/01/11 11:15 PM
Here's a primer on tonight's TS Eliot Prize, with poems from all the contenders http://bit.ly/hjrI2R  #books

Will Richardson (@willrich45)
24/01/11 11:31 PM
Reading: A project on the future of education http://bit.ly/eIJYXc  Interesting vision

Josh Stumpenhorst (@stumpteacher)
24/01/11 11:46 PM
Watching and discussing this with my team today: TED talk about engaging boys in EDU http://bit.ly/gFBJ6S  #edchat

Judy O'Connell (@heyjudeonline)
24/01/11 11:58 PM
The simplybooks Daily is out! http://bit.ly/9VRDYi  ▸ Top stories today by @booksin140 @sydneyunipress @thereadingzone @readingtub

Josh Stumpenhorst (@stumpteacher)
25/01/11 12:08 AM
What is innovation? Be innovative this week! http://bit.ly/gmI1lm  #edchat #ntchat

Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly)
25/01/11 12:06 AM
Our First Year With Amazon Kindle as an Independent Publisher http://bit.ly/g7rTzU

Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly)
25/01/11 12:16 AM
From FutureBook: what book publishers can learn from the gaming world. http://bit.ly/dS9SP6

Phillippa Cleaves (@pipcleaves)
25/01/11 7:26 AM
Imagine if our own students made a social network like these :-) RT @ITJil: 20 Social Networks for Lifelong Learners http://bit.ly/bC6zZZ
 
Judy O'Connell (@heyjudeonline)
25/01/11 8:27 AM
A New Culture of Learning: some thoughts. http://amplify.com/u/anj49

Tehani Wessely (@editormum75)
25/01/11 7:59 AM
The Shaun Tan cover art of Australis Imaginarium is eligible for nomination to the Chronos Awards! http://bit.ly/dZIx8o

Motivational Quotes (@motivatquotes)
25/01/11 7:44 AM
You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. ~ Jim Rohn

tripwire magazine (@tripwiremag)
25/01/11 5:21 AM
40+ Fresh and Amazing Free Fonts to Download http://su.pr/5Dljb3

Phillippa Cleaves (@pipcleaves)
25/01/11 7:52 AM
RT @RoshOR: “@willrich45:"A Tilt in Thought" from a principal. http://bit.ly/dFjThC Good stuff.” lets stop whining and just get on with it. 
 
Bobbi Newman (@librarianbyday)
25/01/11 8:53 AM
Top Ten Links 2.3 – All About Ebooks
Librarian by Day http://bit.ly/eA7Pqk

Cheers

Ruth

Read the new Twilight novella about Bree Tanner FREE for the next month

Toddle on over to http://www.breetanner.com/ to read this novella free until 5 July 2010. (According to this SMH article).

Don't forget to advise the Twilightery at your school.  I blogged about this at the start of the term, but figured you'd appreciate a reminder.  There will also be a hardback version for sale, is the information I have.

Cheers

Ruth

PS I'm scheduling this to publish on Skerricks on 8 June to accommodate the time difference between here and the US. 

An author on e-books and the future of reading.

Author Anna Quindlen writes about the future of reading for Newsweek - print books, e-books, reading itself.

The conclusion of her article:

As Kafka once said, "A book must be the ax for the frozen sea within us."



Reading is not simply an intellectual pursuit but an emotional and spiritual one. It lights the candle in the hurricane lamp of self; that's why it survives. There are book clubs and book Web sites and books on tape and books online. There are still millions of people who like the paper version, at least for now. And if that changes—well, what is a book, really? Is it its body, or its soul? Would Dickens have recognized a paperback of A Christmas Carol, or, for that matter, a Braille version? Even on a cell-phone screen, Tiny Tim can God-bless us, every one.



Cheers, and more cheers for the axe and the candle
 
Ruth

Young people hate books and dead tree publishing is finished. Yes?

Found this YouTube video via Lucacept.



And Lucacept's discussion about the issues facing libraries lending files (e-books, audiobooks) is most relevant and not, at present, finding answers from publishers.

Watch the video on YouTube here if you the one above doesn't work for you.
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Weq_sHxghcg&feature=player_embedded
It's a brilliant video.  Brilliant.  Bravo DK/Penguin USA.

Cheers

Ruth

PS. And the format of this strikes me as having possibilities for writing, too.

E-books and e-book readers in Australia

This blog entry began with one newspaper article, and has grown like Topsy; I've added more links to ebookery as I've found them.

Sydney Morning Herald columnist Elizabeth Farrelly had an opinion piece published at Easter about her Kindle e-reader.  Her major criticism (and it's my criticism too, in relation to e-books and audiobooks): the limited availability of up to date copyright content to Australian-address customers.  Amazon won't tell you ahead of time what you can't get here (thousands fewer titles than to US subscribers), and Audible hides lots if you log in as yourself (ie as a subscriber in Australia - I'm on the point of cancelling my Audible subscription for precisely this reason, unavailable content.  I'm not talking about, for example, audiobooks that don't exist - the recordings do, and if I was in the US I could buy them). 

Publishers, authors and agents need to get themselves sorted on rights for audiobooks and e-books so that we in Australia can read and listen to the same range as readers/listeners in the UK and US.  It's crazy that you can buy a print copy (eg of a multimillion bestseller) but not, for example, a Kindle copy if you're an Australian-address buyer.  Their choices are sabotaging our use of this technology, and limiting their profits (a very odd thing in a capitalist world, imho).  Buyers are willing to pay for copyright content, but publishers, authors, agents (and Amazon - if I was i/c there I'd be chivvying the others like crazy) are just saying no.  Do they realise their daftness?  Into the vacuum they create the pirates are, I'm sure, oh-so-willing to provide an alternative - with no profits to authors, agents, publishers or Amazon.  Daft.

A quote:

But I did want something to read. Something compressed and intelligent for the plane or the swag. But apart from The Spectator and The New York Times, it's like an airport bookstore with the good bits removed. Kindle Australia has four readable books. Three Stieg Larssons and Stoker's Dracula. I've read them.



Everything else is called Midnight in Madrid or How to Make A Million Bucks with a Gleaming Smile and a Flat Belly. You can't search alphabetically, and much as Amazon vaunts its relationship with publishers you can't get Pete Dexter or Tim Winton or A.A. Gill and if you search Carl Hiaasen you get three Lee Goldberg westerns and a self-helper called Active Senior Living.


and her rather nice final line:

Hmm. Burnt by kindling. Hot cross you, April Fool me.

Read all about it: Easter: when a Kindle surprise turns into a curate's egg, by Elizabeth Farrelly.

Here endeth this rant.  Well, for now.  Haven't even touched on e-book and audiobook rights in a library/lending context as opposed to an individual reader/subscriber.

There's another good and long article about e-books in Australia here: The e-book revolution is coming to a screen near you, by Charlotte Harper - SMH/Canberra Times.  It points out that the US-centric focus of Amazon also means few Australian books available for Kindle yet; and reiterates the point that piracy will take up the space left by dawdling publishers.

A shorter blog piece at the Committed Sardine, entitled, Don't believe the e-book sceptics includes these four principles for considering change:

(Farhad) Manjoo lays out four principles for more successful predictions about our digital future:


1. Good predictions are based on current trends
2. Don't underestimate people's capacity for change
3. New stuff sometimes come out of the blue
4. These days it's best to err on the side of (technological) optimism


The last piece also refers to a well-known 1995 Newsweek essay by Clifford Stoll, entitled (entrancingly), The internet? Bah! Read an evaluation of this piece here, which points out that while Clifford Stoll may have been proved totally wrong on many things...

Let's get this over with. Here is a list of things Stoll calls "baloney" on—each and every one of which has a thriving utility in 2010:


•telecommuting
•interactive libraries
•multimedia classrooms
•electronic town meetings
•virtual communities
•taking a computer to the beach
•getting books and newspapers online
•e-commerce, online shopping, and e-payments
•booking airline tickets and restaurant reservations

...he is also, in 2010, a good sport about his essay being cited over and over for its lack of prescience. (Nick Summers: Let's talk about the 1995 Newsweek piece that says the internet will fail).

Author Alan Baxter blogs that ebooks are the future. (Found via Darcy Moore's blog)

There are so many e-book articles around - if you want to contribute links in the comments to any which you have found useful/informative, please do.

Cheers

Ruth

Reading in a time of change, by Margaret Simons

An excellent, thought-provoking article published in Overland magazine, Reading in a time of change by Margaret Simons was prompted by but not only about, the iPad.  E-books, e-readers,all sorts of reading in these times of change.  She discusses the experience of reading for herself, her children, her grandson, and concludes:

My father was also staying with us over summer. Thirty years older than me, he is still working out how to use his mobile phone but email – that ancient technology – is his main means of staying in touch with friends around the world. He reads local newspapers for the crosswords. He takes the Guardian Weekly in print form and is dismayed by the idea it may be delivered only online in future. He had not heard of Twitter until I told him about it.

Of course, he was called to sit down and read to my grandson. He pointed to the dog in the book, and my grandson made the connection with the dog in the room. The experience of reading was not a thing by itself but something intimately associated with the growth of a mind, with socialisation and even with motor skills.


Perhaps, in this very ordinary and familiar convergence of an infant’s growth, we can glimpse something of our future.

Cheers

Ruth

E-books and print books: lifespan thoughts

Following on from yesterday's entry about Book 1, I came back to something that had been occupying a far corner of my brain for a while, a print book/e book question.

When I buy a physical/print book for the school library, theoretically I am buying an infinite number of reads/loans.  I can lend it out as many times as I like.  Realistically, I am not.  The most popular books get read to death, fall apart from the love, the wear and tear, the realities of library shelves and school bags and the handling of different readers and so forth. (While those I have misjudged, or which just don't find readers, remain sadly pristine...and end up being culled).

And so, in the case of popular books, one buys another copy to replace the one that is beyond repair, and so the author gets another royalty, as is more than reasonable, since they've written something that has found friends.

Pixels and digital files, however, while they have their own potential wear-and-tear (file corruption? hardware failure?) are not subject to the same physical limitations as print and paper.  But in the case of e-books and audiobooks (digital audiobook files, rather than physical housings such as CDs or audiocassettes), we kinda sorta expect to buy once and have it forever.  So whether it's thumpingly popular or resoundingly ignored, the author's return is the same.  Not entirely fair.

Perhaps this has all been canvassed elsewhere (do leave any useful links in the comments), but my mind has ticked over to wondering what is a reasonable equivalent.  How many loans do I reasonably expect from a copy of, say, Tomorrow When the War Began, or Twilight, or [insert your own popular title here]?  Thirty?  Fifty?  I'm not counting accidents (the rainstorm, the leaking drink bottle, the younger sibling with a felt pen) that can shorten a school  library book's life rather quickly.  But a paperback (and most fiction is paperback, and the most popular books in the library are often fiction) does not have an endless life, as a library book.  If we buy an e-book in a form that permits lending, how many 'loans' should that one purchase permit before we should/need to buy another licence for that title, so the author gets recompense for their popularity?

Hardback books, of course, generally have a longer life since they have a more durable construction; and nonfiction, in our library, has a lot more hardbacks than paperbacks.

So in terms of e-books and libraries, I wonder if what we can arrive at is a two-tier system, kinda equivalent to hardback and paperback.  Title X can be bought in 'hardback', which allows more loans before the file expires/needs renewal; or 'paperback', which allows fewer loans before licence renewal.  This would also mean that if you weren't certain of a title's likely popularity, or knew it was a niche purchase for a relatively small group of students (eg. a specific senior course) you could invest at the lower rate and be able to spread your budget across more titles.  Rather important, given the limited funds available to most school libraries.

I know I'm ignoring the whole question of e-book readers, e-publication formats, e-book lending logistics for school libraries and so forth.  Plenty of discussion around on that.

But why don't you go find a couple of your most popular library books and see how often they've been read (and estimate how many more loans they will survive)?  What do you think, then, is the average reasonable lifespan, in terms of number of loans, of a school library book, a paperback and a hardback?  Do leave a comment - it will be interesting to compare people's thoughts. 

Cheers

Ruth

PS in relation to e-book textbooks, right now the rental/annual subscription rates publishers are offering do not seem to comprehend the reality of faculty budgets.  I know they have costs to cover, but from discussion I've heard, head teachers find the prices out of reach.  Which can't help the publishers, since they presumably want customers.  For print textbooks, a $X investment in print books means a number of years of use; when a publisher wants even half of $X per year for an e-book textbook subscription, faculties just don't have it.  I watch, with interest, to see how this develops.

When I'm reading, I do one thing...

The blog Smart Bitches, Trashy Books is a most useful source for information and discussion about e-books and e-reading devices.  In a January entry, Sarah said this:

But when I'm reading, I do one thing and one thing only...

...and while that may seem bleeding obvious, it's also pertinent, relevant and insightful.  When the kids we teach are accustomed to - expect to? - do multiple things at once, enabled by computers and technology and the internet and so forth, reading remains something that requires focus and attention.  Strikes me that this has usefulness beyond the fun/pleasure of reading: it gives kids a different experience, an opportunity to learn a different skill.  Another skill, along with multitasking.  Getting lost in a book - always excellent.  Being able to focus, also useful.

Here's an extract from the entry, Reading, Writing and Technology: Changing Readers and Reading:

If Cashmore is correct in his predictions for multifunction devices, and if, as Pierre Teilhard de Chardin - and Flannery O’Connor - insist, everything that rises must converge, the possibility of more functional programs targeted at diverse activities meant for a single device means that readers will have a lot to choose from when they actually sit down to read. As new multi-function devices are appearing in the realm of nearly possible and almost on sale like ships on the horizon line, I find myself looking again and again at how I read, what I read, and whether it’s changed at all.

The following aspect of my reading habits has not changed: reading is one of the very few times I do Only One Thing. Anyone with a uterus knows what I’m talking about: I multitask. Most of the time, I’m researching, writing, using Twitter, writing email, and listening to music. Or, I’m washing bottles and plates, making lunches, serving and preparing dinner, talking to Hubby, refereeing fights over Lego Sir Topham Hat, and possibly also snacking. I never do just one thing at a time... 


But when I’m reading, I do one thing and one thing only because I can’t read and focus on anything else.

For that reason, I adore the comfort and simplicity of a dedicated electronic reading device. I don’t want to have things beeping and alerting me and tempting me to Google whether the price has dropped on that giant thing I wanted. I want to do the one thing that restores my mental batteries and gives me the utter mental isolation and thoughtful peace I crave when I’m exhausted: just reading, nothing but reading, and only, exceptionally reading.

One thing we've been working on in relation to this in our library is the creation of our reading lounge areas, so kids can relax, be comfortable and get lost in reading.  We now have enough comfortable, soft seats for every student in a class of thirty to be sitting in one.  A few still prefer the floor, and we still have the floor cushions; but with every student seated comfortably, they settle down, relax and read far more effectively.  See? It's not just 'decorating'.   Comfort is a tool and a strategy.

At break times, I'm a bit of a mean cow: the reading lounge areas are for [book] reading - the laptoppers are welcome to settle at the tables/desks, but I move them on from the reading lounges, so the screens and moving images and (often) discussions are not a distraction.  (It's also ergonomically a bit smarter for the laptoppers, too).

Cheers

Ruth

50% off e-books (less than an hour more today)

SmartBitchesTrashyBooks has an e-book discount coupon that's valid still for just under another hour.  50% off at AllRomanceebooks.com and Omnilit.com. 

The rules: You will receive 50% off on all titles purchased on AllRomanceeBooks.com and OmniLit.com through this weekend if they use the code SBTBARe1.


The discount will only appear once the code is entered in the shopping cart and the “Calculate Discount” button is selected. This offer expires at midnight 31 January 2010, 11:59 PM Mountain Standard Time.


Before you start sniffing, (if you do start sniffing), think on this:

Evernight by Claudia Gray $6.99 -50%
1000 Art Journal Pages $29.99 -50%

1000 Artist Trading Cards $29.99 -50%
A bunch of graphic/comic novels

There's fiction, bodice-ripping if you want that, but plenty else if you don't, and nonfiction too.  Haven't yet read Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire series (on which the TV series True Blood is based?).  Buy one or more.  Dead Until Dark is the first in the series ($6.99- 50%).

All prices in $US, but the exchange rate is pretty good for the AUD right now, it's hovering around 90c.

There are various formats available for various titles, but most I've looked at seem to include a secure Adobe format which should be readable through Acrobat Reader (check the site FAQs for answers to your own particular questions on this), so you don't need an e-reader or iPhone, a computer will do - desktop, laptop, netbook, whatever.

If you haven't tried an e-book at all, or only a plain vanilla free download from somewhere like Project Gutenberg, why not try one from here?  You can try a novel for under $5.  What about being an art teacher and being able to fling open a page of the artist trading cards book (which weighs a bit in the real world, with its quality paper to reproduce the images)?

Cheers

Ruth

E-books and e-book readers in Australia; and the last week of term

If you're interested in this topic, read Kathryn Greenhill's blog for lots of useful information, links and more.  Especially useful because it's from an Australian, relating to what's available here.

In answer to a recent question, no, nobody has sent me a Kindle to review (sigh!).

The Sydney Morning Herald reports that Apple's e-reader tablet computer seems likely to become available in 2010 (read the article here).  Pricey at $1000US, though.

It's been crazy-busy around here with the end of the term and the school year (Australia's school year follows the calendar year) fast approaching (just this week to go), stocktake, chasing overdues and supervising some renovations we've been undertaking too (imagination, paint, fabric and people saying "WOW" quite spontaneously!) (I'll hold the pictures and info on those till next term, because we ain't quite finished...).  So blog entries have been not quite daily as per usual.  But I'm sure you understand, dear reader.  Don't you?

Pictures of the other school library Christmas trees will, however, go up this week (when I have ones that are in focus, my little camera doesn't always like lit Christmas trees).    Three days left with the kids at school, two days after that of staff development activities, and then it's the summer holiday break, hip hip hooray!  Still lots to do before the final bell...

Cheers

Ruth
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Free e-books from The Book Depository

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Read all about it here.

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Cheers

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Ruth

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PS. We've started Christmas decorating in the school  library, and I'll show you some photos soon, as a couple of things are still In Progress...

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Dark territory made light: republishing titles as e-books

Since the e-book format was not born/thought of/included in contracts when many many books were published (well, most, really) - it's not surprising that publishers are moving into this dark territory and looking  to make existing backlist titles available in this new format.  Read about one such publisher here.  According to Jane Friedman, "Electronic 'is going to be the centre of the universe'".  It's an interesting insight into current thinking and developments in the world of e-books - not just in the publishing model, but in the use of social media to publicise the e-books. 
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Cheers

Ruth
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PS I have not (yet) been offered a Kindle to review.  Just in case you wondered...!!
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Dear Australian reader, Mr Bezos would like to sell you an Amazon Kindle

He would.  Cost (for Kindle and a leather cover) including shipping is just under $400 Australian (note: the exchange rate's in our favour at present at around 90c to the $1US).   Toddle over to http://www.amazon.com/ and see...

They've sorted international wireless, so if you're in area (check them thar coverage maps...) download time is likely to be under a minute, but books are $2 more than US Kindle owners pay. 
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What isn't immediately clear is whether publishing territory will come into play - ie. if the rights aren't available 'for this geographic area' - the trouble I've run into with Audible.com - is the book available to Australian Kindle owners?  Are we shopping from the same range as US Kindle owners?  There is a link to a country-specific page to address country-specific issues including content availability, but it doesn't outline content limitations beyond saying it offers over 280,000 books to Australia (and the main Kindle page offers US buyers over 350,000 books).  Me, I'd want to know which are the 70,000 unavailable to me here in Oz....
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But even so, it's a verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry interesting change to the e-book landscape here.  By far the cheapest specific e-book device I'm aware of here (the Dymocks Iliad at around $1000 looks very naff by comparison), and the largest range of books (caveat: still depends on which books...).
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And of course there are all the general limitations/differences in relation to a Kindle edition.  Can't be lent (unless you lend the device), sold/donated, for instance.  I'd rather lend out a $30 book than a $400 device in the library (even assuming there is a Kindle setup accommodating school library ownership/use).
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Ah, but is there a lazy $400 lying around Chez Skerricks, the modest palais this blog calls Emoh Ruo?  Hmmmmm. 
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Cheers
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Ruth
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PS Anyone want me to evaluate one?????  I'll write you a lovely report...
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Discussing DRM (and e-books)

Even the slightest acquaintance with discussion swirling around e-books will likely trip you over the idea of DRM, or Digital Rights Management.  Publishers like it because it means recompense for work.  Readers range from acceptance to active hostility, when DRM encoding means an e-book usefulness/ability to be read may be severely limited (eg. to few file types, or a single e-reader device etc).  Naomi Novik, author of the Temeraire series, participated in an interesting discussion on DRM: Will E-book Anti-Piracy Technology Hurt Readers on NPR.  Read a summary of the discussion, or listen to it in full, here.
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Cheers,
Ruth
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Advance look at Catching Fire (sequel to The Hunger Games)

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I've had a waiting list for this for months - lots of readers of The Hunger Games wanting to find out what happens next... (I did a blog entry about The Hunger Games here.)

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It's out soon, but if you want to read or listen to a chapter of Suzanne Collins' next book in the trilogy, in advance, NPR in the US has Chapter Two here. (which was also the source of the picture above).

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Cheers

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Ruth

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A free e-story: Boojum

A while ago I read the anthology of pirate stories, Fast Ships, Black Sails, edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer: they've edited a number of anthologies in the fantasy/steampunk genres, generally pitched at an adult audience (which isn't to say the stories aren't good for kids, but is to say that the anthologies aren't constructed to eliminate that which might not be considered by some suitable for an adolescent audience).

My favourite story in this anthology, without a doubt, was Boojum by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear.  Black Alice is a space pirate, not a wet pirate, on a ship that is a creature (a boojum); it's a clever clever tale with a twist.  It was one I lent to senior Extension English students to look at as an idea of how a longer short piece of writing might be constructed (since a number of them were writing prose fiction for their major works).

And tootling around on Google in the hols, I discovered that of all the pirate stories in all the world, this one is available online (as described in this blog entry) as an e-story pdf,  Hurrah!  Click here to read BOOJUM!

It has a couple of bits of contextual coarse language in it, so if that's a concern for you read it first before sharing with kids (read it anyway, just because it's good).  It's high school level in its ideas, rather than primary school.  But if you're looking for an e-example of a story to share, try this.

Cheers

Ruth