Have ebooks changed your reading habits?

[LadyKate]

While I always loved a good series and frequently read them before I started reading ebooks, I have to say the way I read now has changed.

I tend to read by series more (and rereading is so much more pleasant with not having to search the entire house to find book 2 lol)

I also tend to read by author when I find one I like, searching for all the books available.

What about you?

[HarryT]

I've been reading primarily ebooks for so long (about 30 years now), that in all honesty I struggle to remember what my reading habits were before I started doing so. I started out with books from PG, but even many of my commercial ebooks are approaching 20 years old!

You're right, though - ebooks makes it a lot easier to read series in order, which is exactly what I generally do.

[GERGE]

Self published books. That is the only change, and a very good change.

[Ripplinger]

I also tend to read complete series now and in order, and hunt down books by similar authors that I've read and liked. Plus just reading a lot more since it's become so much more convenient.

[church mouse]

Like Ripplinger said, I just read so much more now. I was very bad to my PBs - bending them, damaging the spines, losing my bookmarked place - so we divorced by mutual consent.
I have also found that, by using Calibre to organise my library, I am far better at ensuring I alternate between genres (using my own assigned tags) so that I never follow a book with one from the same genre.
The interesting test is about to come because I have just bought my first paperback for 8 years (spotted in a charity shop a copy of something I have wanted to read for years but is not available in ebook), but will I still be such a cruel lover to my PB?

[FizzyWater]

I'm more likely to put a book down if it's not catching my interest now. I think it's because there are always more on the reader - where before I just had the one (or maybe two) paperbacks in my purse.

[rhadin]

For the first few years of the modern (long after Harry started) era of ebooks, I found that most of my reading time had switched from print to ebooks. But within the past 18 months or so, I found that I have returned to print books for about 75% of my reading. What I find off-putting about ebooks is the price combined with the limitations.

However, ebooks have changed one significant aspect of my reading: I am now interested in finding good indie authors in the genres I like to read for pleasure. (I rarely read nonfiction ebooks; probably 98% of all my ebook reading is fiction.) I don't mind spending a few dollars on an ebook and I like that I can often preview an ebook.

But the love of ebooks that readers like Harry have and profess eludes me. Perhaps it is because most of my reading is nonfiction or perhaps it is my age, but I find I am less interested in ebooks than I was previously.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by rhadin

But the love of ebooks that readers like Harry have and profess eludes me. Perhaps it is because most of my reading is nonfiction or perhaps it is my age, but I find I am less interested in ebooks than I was previously.

There are two main reasons for it, Richard:

1. Storage space. By the mid 1990s my house had reached the stage where I had double-stacked bookshelves along every accessible wall surface, and no room for any more. Ebooks allow me to have as many books as I want without running out of storage space. These days I use my bookshelves for my non-fiction books that aren't available as ebooks (or which are easier to use as paper books), and a very small number of my particular favourite fiction books which I have as good-quality hardbacks, such as my 3-volume illustrated versions of "The Lord of the Rings".

2. I travel a great deal, both with work and for pleasure, and ebooks allow me to have a large number of books with me at all times. Prior to ebooks I would always agonise about which books to take with me on a trip; now I just take my Kindle and I have close to 2000 books with me.

[Apache]

Originally Posted by HarryT

There are two main reasons for it, Richard:

1. Storage space. By the mid 1990s my house had reached the stage where I had double-stacked bookshelves along every accessible wall surface, and no room for any more. Ebooks allow me to have as many books as I want without running out of storage space. These days I use my bookshelves for my non-fiction books that aren't available as ebooks (or which are easier to use as paper books), and a very small number of my particular favourite fiction books which I have as good-quality hardbacks, such as my 3-volume illustrated versions of "The Lord of the Rings".

2. I travel a great deal, both with work and for pleasure, and ebooks allow me to have a large number of books with me at all times. Prior to ebooks I would always agonise about which books to take with me on a trip; now I just take my Kindle and I have close to 2000 books with me.

This was my situation too. To many books and not enough book shelves.

I do not travel as much as I used to but, when I do I can take all of my books with me.
Apache

[latepaul]

I read a little more than I used to. But I buy a lot more than I used to. Because ebooks are cheap, easy to get and often impulse buys. Also my TBR pile is no longer a physical thing that stops me buying.

[pwalker8]

I started reading ebooks in the late 1990's when Baen started putting out his ebook bundles.

The biggest changes for me are

1) I tend to read by mood more since I don't have to search the house for a book that fits my mood.

2) I read multiple books at a time. Well, actually I did this before, but it's a lot easier not to lose track of what books I'm reading

3) I tend to go on reading binges more from the stand point that I'll find a series, author or subject that I find interesting then read several of that in a row. For example, I just finished John Ringo's Black Tide Rising series. I had bought the first one as part of a bundle some time ago and never got around to reading it. Then a month ago, I gave it a shot, liked it, bought the other three and read those (also got the audio books since Amazon had them real cheap if you had purchased the ebook). I just finished Anonymous Soldiers, a book about the Struggle for Israel from 1917 to 1947. That peaked my interest, so I bought several more books on the various Israeli-Arab wars.

4) I have all my books with me at all times, so I read more at lunch more and in the various time periods when I'm waiting.

Actually, I would say that the biggest change is more in how I buy books (which leads to how I read). It's easier to buy whole series now. I normally try to read series in order, so before, if I happened to see a book in the book store that looked interesting, and I saw it was the 3rd in a series, but the first two where not stocked, I didn't buy it. Now, I see a book online line that I like, I see it's the 3rd of a series and I buy all three.

[patrickt]

A. I live in Oaxaca, Mexico, and prefer to read in English. So, for twelve years I read what I could find. It wasn't totally hopeless but sometimes it got a bit grim. With my Kindle I can read what I want to read.

B. I used to read series but have abandoned most of them. I got fed up with Mathew Scudders alcoholism and AA fundamentalism. I got tired of hearing about Kay Scarpetta's lesbian niece who was the FBI agent. And Inspector Ian Banks' love life is a bore.

C. I agree with a previous poster. When I bought paper books and lugged them home I tended to read them. Now, if a book a bad I'll dump it. My record was a book that started with five pages of detailed torture and when it shifted to the gang rape of the tortured woman I dumped it. I think I was on page six.

D. FWIW, when I was working my reading was 98% non-fiction and was work-related. Once I quite working I flipped and now my reading is 95% fiction.

E. I know it's just a business but I appreciate Amazon making the first Kindle, pursuing the market when it was almost non-existent, and being a source of books for me to read. Thanks, folks.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by patrickt

A. I live in Oaxaca, Mexico, and prefer to read in English. So, for twelve years I read what I could find. It wasn't totally hopeless but sometimes it got a bit grim. With my Kindle I can read what I want to read.

B. I used to read series but have abandoned most of them. I got fed up with Mathew Scudders alcoholism and AA fundamentalism. I got tired of hearing about Kay Scarpetta's lesbian niece who was the FBI agent. And Inspector Ian Banks' love life is a bore.

C. I agree with a previous poster. When I bought paper books and lugged them home I tended to read them. Now, if a book a bad I'll dump it. My record was a book that started with five pages of detailed torture and when it shifted to the gang rape of the tortured woman I dumped it. I think I was on page six.

D. FWIW, when I was working my reading was 98% non-fiction and was work-related. Once I quite working I flipped and now my reading is 95% fiction.

E. I know it's just a business but I appreciate Amazon making the first Kindle, pursuing the market when it was almost non-existent, and being a source of books for me to read. Thanks, folks.

My record for giving up on a book was about the same. I bought it back when I was a teenager because the blurb on the back compared it to Tolkien (this was during the first Tolkien craze in the mid 70's). It started with an illicit act on a sheep. I tossed it in the garbage. What was funny is that my mother got it out of the garbage and because it had a colorful cover, put it in the bookcase. For years, she had a hard core porno book in the living room bookcase. Being a typical teenager, this provided me endless mirth. I don't think I ever got around to explaining what the book was about to her.

[cfrizz]

I stopped buying and reading paper back in the 90s because of space issues as well as too small font size. I switched over to reading fanfiction on my pc. I bought my first Sony reader back in 2010 and never looked back.

My library consists of 95% series, with authors I like. Some of them I have stopped purchasing their books because they just went off the rails or became too repetitive.

But that's the wonderful thing about my pc & reader/tablets, I have plenty of room to find a new author to add their books to.

[cvkemp]

I read a lot more than before and even if I have paper books at home I am only reading ebooks now. I love reading on my Kindle.