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Monday, July 23, 2007

Reading and Technology - Susanna Carr

When I started reading romances, I only knew of a couple other readers who liked romance books. They were my twin sister and a few of our friends. We traded, recommended, and discussed the books as often as we could. When we finally got our drivers licenses, we would pile up in a car and make trips to romance-friendly bookstores.

Our group of readers was small. I knew these romance readers because they were already in my circle of friends. Eventually our reading tastes shifted and developed, and we realized we wanted very different things from our books. One was really into the dark gothic stories while another was on the perpetual hunt for traditional Regencies. As for me, I couldn't get enough of the Harlequins and the contemporaries.

Then came the Internet.

I was thrilled when authors I've read for years put up their own websites. I found out more about their books, their booklists and what was coming next. I thought it was great when Harlequin developed their online community at eharlequin.com. I now could hear from others who read the same kind of books I did. I couldn't imagine anything better than that.

Until the emergence of bulletin boards and blogs. And then there was Yahoogroups, which allowed people of a specific interest to go off on their own and discuss. Suddenly there was MySpace, where a reader could gather all of her friends and her specific interests onto one page.

I've heard of Bebo and Facebook, but I haven't really looked into those to see what makes them different than MySpace. Why haven't I looked? Because I'm busy building my shelf at Shelfari.com. Add a book on the shelf and you will immediately find out who else has that book on their shelf. This is a reader's paradise.

I wished I had this community when I was a teenager and trying to find a book that would deliver what I want, but there is a price to the sense of connection. All of this technology is quickly becoming an addiction—and eating into my reading time!
Susanna

6 comments:

Dschauffer said...

Thanks for mentioning Shelfari. I work there, add me as a friend "schaufferwaffer". Do you
have any good book recommendations?
Have you seen our Harry Potter contest? http://www.shelfari.com/harrypotter/

Cherie J said...

Amazing on how the technology evolves so rapidly. Hard to keep up with it.

Mary Kirkland said...

I love having the internet to keep up with the latest books and see what other people like to read. It's really been helpful in finding books from authors I probably wouldn't have looked at otherwise.

Lois said...

Oh geez, how technology has changed my life. . . well, once upon a time, I browsed the bookstore, not really knowing what it is that I was going to leave the store with. Now, I go in with lists, to buy, to look at, to buy one of these days when I have the money. . . and then knowing when books are coming out, even a year in advance. . . and then an even bigger thing, talking to authors! Never would have thought I'd ever do that!!!! LOL :)

Lois

Shelia said...

I'll have to check out that site. I'm on yahoo and myspace already. I haven't tried any of those other sites though.

China Goods News Blog Weekly said...

I've download an ebook of it and read it. I want to know whether Susanna is a good thinker and author. I guess the book Red-Hot and Royal is also attractive.