MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Need help buying books for a teenage girl

GntlmnBndt · 08-04-2008, 02:08 PM

So, the surgery and the immediate aftermath appear to be going well.

I liked the craft idea, and decided she was a bit old for me to be making a bunch of decisions without her input, so I talked to her about what she would like, in terms of a craft, ebook reader, books, etc. Quite the eye-opening experience.

As for the craft, she has been wanting to take up art, specifically computer art. As she shares a computer with her sister, and at her grandmother's she won't even have that, this is a bit difficult. So, we have re-purposed an older mac laptop we had here at the house that will give her some flexibility for watching DVDs and will work with an inexpensive digitizing tablet we picked up.

As for the ebook reader, she preferred something that would fit in her pocket for the hospital/doctor visits, and specifically something that would play some mind-numbing puzzle games as she tends to be too nervous during those visits to read. Again, the gadget-hoarding uncle to the rescue, with an old Palm-OS handheld. Still works, and I installed Bejeweled and some others. Since she wants to read on both the handheld and the mac, and PDFs seem to be a poor choice, she is getting her books in eReader format. It does limit her choices, but she did find lots of good choices.

I offered several of your suggestions, and let her look around a bit on her own. She has downloaded Terrier (by Pierce), several by Pratchett and Lackey, and a new trilogy by Weis and Hickman, since she liked the old Dragon Lance chronicles. She started to get the Gemma Doyle series, but one of the books is not available in eReader at the moment, so she is holding off for now (I may pick it up in paper for her). I won lots of points with several of your recommendations, and I thank you all!

I will say I get quite the lecture when I suggested the Twilight series someone mentioned, and seemed to be the topic of several threads here last week. Sounded like a popular series to me but, as she put it, they need to go back to using the name Horror for that genre, as she is tired of people confusing Dark Fantasy with "real fantasy books" (whatever that is). Specifically, vampires popping up in her otherwise normal fantasy books is considered a bad thing, and when they try to make the vampire sympathetic, or worse a good guy, I think the girl's head simply explodes.

The paper graphic novels also went over well, Ranma and Fushigi Yuugi in particular.

Thank you all again for the wonderful suggestions. You made things easier for her, and made me a popular uncle in the process. Her mother does not allow her to participate in online forums, but the entire family has asked me to offer their many thanks as well.

The Bandit

08-04-2008, 02:08 PM	#19
GntlmnBndt Zealot Posts: 135 Karma: 142 Join Date: Jul 2008 Device: iPod Touch, iPad	THANK YOU ALL! So, the surgery and the immediate aftermath appear to be going well. I liked the craft idea, and decided she was a bit old for me to be making a bunch of decisions without her input, so I talked to her about what she would like, in terms of a craft, ebook reader, books, etc. Quite the eye-opening experience. As for the craft, she has been wanting to take up art, specifically computer art. As she shares a computer with her sister, and at her grandmother's she won't even have that, this is a bit difficult. So, we have re-purposed an older mac laptop we had here at the house that will give her some flexibility for watching DVDs and will work with an inexpensive digitizing tablet we picked up. As for the ebook reader, she preferred something that would fit in her pocket for the hospital/doctor visits, and specifically something that would play some mind-numbing puzzle games as she tends to be too nervous during those visits to read. Again, the gadget-hoarding uncle to the rescue, with an old Palm-OS handheld. Still works, and I installed Bejeweled and some others. Since she wants to read on both the handheld and the mac, and PDFs seem to be a poor choice, she is getting her books in eReader format. It does limit her choices, but she did find lots of good choices. I offered several of your suggestions, and let her look around a bit on her own. She has downloaded Terrier (by Pierce), several by Pratchett and Lackey, and a new trilogy by Weis and Hickman, since she liked the old Dragon Lance chronicles. She started to get the Gemma Doyle series, but one of the books is not available in eReader at the moment, so she is holding off for now (I may pick it up in paper for her). I won lots of points with several of your recommendations, and I thank you all! I will say I get quite the lecture when I suggested the Twilight series someone mentioned, and seemed to be the topic of several threads here last week. Sounded like a popular series to me but, as she put it, they need to go back to using the name Horror for that genre, as she is tired of people confusing Dark Fantasy with "real fantasy books" (whatever that is). Specifically, vampires popping up in her otherwise normal fantasy books is considered a bad thing, and when they try to make the vampire sympathetic, or worse a good guy, I think the girl's head simply explodes. The paper graphic novels also went over well, Ranma and Fushigi Yuugi in particular. Thank you all again for the wonderful suggestions. You made things easier for her, and made me a popular uncle in the process. Her mother does not allow her to participate in online forums, but the entire family has asked me to offer their many thanks as well. The Bandit Last edited by GntlmnBndt; 08-04-2008 at 02:11 PM.