I’m sure by now everyone has heard the news that Dorchester plans to stop production of mass market books in favor of trade paperback and e-books. Click the link above to read the reasoning behind this decision from Dorchester themselves.
As Bob Dylan once sang, The Times They Are A Changing! It seems with the world going gaga over ebooks, this would give authors more control over their fiction. It makes me wonder if, in the future, huge publishing conglomerates will be necessary when a dedicated author can create and package his or her own book? This may even be a big boon to independent book editors (I don’t care who you are or how successful you are, every writer needs an editor!)
On July 20 of t
his year, the Wall Street Journal reported that e-book sales at Amazon.com in the last three months outnumbered print books sales. Can I get a WOW!!! A few years ago when I started out as a published author I was published solely in e-books. All of us e-book authors, publishers and cover artists predicted there would come a time when the world would go e-book. Still, as an author there’s something special about going into a brick and mortar store, walking the aisles and seeing your books on the shelves. There’s nothing like that feeling in the world, except maybe, going back to said bookstore and finding one of your books is missing from the shelf!!
Although I hope there’s never a time when print books are no longer available (I’ll always love the feel of holding a print book in my hands) I think that anything that has the potential of giving authors more control over their work is a great thing!!!
Heather Elizabeth King 
I adore books. I have a kindle but I still go to the library at least once a week for those books I want to read but not necessarily own/pay for. One thing I love about e-readers is I can support an author (like IR authors) without having them gather dust. Also, I love being able to reread a segment or even a whole novel at any time anywhere. I doubt that print will die off anytime in my lifetime but I love love love my kindle, my husband loves his and my 12 yr old covets one too.
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It’s crazy to think about how far technology has brought us. Five years ago would you have imagined there’d be a device smaller than a hard cover book that would hold dozens upon dozens of books?!
You bring up a great point with the library. I library can’t rent ebooks, unless someday there’s a way to upload a book in someone’s Kindle with a four week time limit.
Thanks for your input!
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