Ashley Newell
Unleash the literary abandon!
  • Home
  • Publications & Products
    • Books >
      • Galen
      • Freakhouse
    • Games
    • All Works
  • Blog
  • EVENTS

Why I (Sort of) Hate E-Books

8/2/2016

0 Comments

 
The original title of this post was going to be flat out "Why I hate e-books", but that was when I was in the height of formatting Galen so my temper was very short on the subject. Thankfully Freakhouse has not been as aggravating so I'm coming down off of my tyrannical high-horse - just by a little bit though.

So I'm going to tell this story backwards - at least in terms of how I lived it out:

Formatting Freakhouse was actually pretty straight-forward. File conversions through Kindle are pretty easy, and as long as I go back through in the webpage viewer and re-create page breaks, everything pretty much looks the way that I want it to. So Freakhouse only took two file submissions for me to be happy. Kobo is a little more finicky in that you really don't have any idea how it looks until you see it in the actual device you want to use, so basically as long is it seems logically laid out, I'm happy enough given that I won't know about EVERY device until someone using something I don't have sees it. 

So this is the good story. Freakhouse isn't a visually complex text, and purposely so. 

Galen, on the other hand, is very purposely formatted. There are three sections which are best identified visually based on the font and structure you're reading. I'm very proud of how the three formats come together in the pattern that they do. I worked very hard on that unique feel that I believe Galen has. 

When a file gets converted to be an e-book, the ideal is that all you need are the words to tell the story, and thus the words can be re-manipulated (visually) to fit different reader needs. So whether you're reading from different devices or even just need to adjust your word size/style to fit how you read on your own device, the words will still be the same regardless of how you manipulate. Do you see how I might have a problem with this?

Galen was not written with e-book in mind. Nor can I see myself writing purely for an e-book format. I'm old school. I like to hold a book. I like to feel a book. And, yes, there's nothing like dusty old book pages - those restricted sections behind glass in fancy libraries, yeah, those are fun just to look at, and even though you can actually hold those books with special gloves, I wouldn't have the heart to touch them because they seem sacred and I am not worthy to be in their presence... I think you can already tell another reason why I'm less sympathetic with non-paper books, and I'm still only halfway through my point.

The e-book is less forgiving with style-specific reading. The Kindle so far seems to be handling it alright, but I'm sure there's a reader out there that loses all of the font variety. That brings me to Kobo. I'm sorry Kobo readers, but the version of Galen you get is not the version of Galen that I love. And THAT is why I have little love for the e-book. Sometimes a book is so much more than just what the words on the page say. Anyone who writes poetry should be able to appreciate this. Where the words go, how they are placed, how big or small the font is, how light or dark, how traditional or innovative the style, it all says something. Now I'm not going to pretend that every piece of fiction I write is a visual work of art. But I do like to believe that I write with intention. 

I have never been a big fan of reading e-books, and now as I try to to format for them, my appreciation has decreased. What meaning might I be losing just because I don't see it the way that it was intended to be seen? I want to experience these books, not just read them.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Picture
    Ashley Newell, stupendous noveling sensation whom you've probably never heard of...

    Categories

    All
    3DayNovel
    Book Club
    Doctor Ood
    Dream Journal
    Game Design
    Games
    #MomLife
    NaNoWriMo
    Personal
    Random Reviews
    Rant
    Shameless Promotion
    Stories And Writing
    Theatre

    Archives

    March 2023
    February 2023
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2019
    April 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    March 2016
    August 2015
    May 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012

    RSS Feed

    Tweets by Olanthea
© COPYRIGHT Ashley Newell and NewellBooks.com 2016. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s authoris strictly prohibited.
Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ashley Newell and NewellBooks.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content
Photos used under Creative Commons from kona99, Tambako the Jaguar, ^Joe, bradleyolin