New Kindle Touch

Two years ago, my big Christmas gift was a Kindle.  I still think paper books are great.  They smell good and have pretty covers and all.  But my Kindle is amazing.  I don't have room to store loads of books.  Books are heavy to pack or travel with.  And the ease of downloading a book from the comfort of my couch in 60 seconds is pretty freaking awesome (especially when you finish a cliffhanger first book in a series and want to immediately start reading the next one).

I wish I'd started using Goodreads before I bought my Kindle, because it has a nifty feature that lets you keep track of how many books you've read in a single year.  (For 2011, I read 63 books!)  I wish I could see the difference in how many books I read post-Kindle versus pre-Kindle.  I am absolutely confident I read more now than I used to.  I carry my Kindle everywhere and read everywhere.  You'd be amazed at how often you find yourself waiting around and can get in 10-20 minutes of reading time.

So when Amazon announced a whole new line of Kindles before the holiday season... I was very tempted to upgrade.  And after reading reviews and doing my research, I asked my parents for the new Kindle Touch as my big Christmas gift this year.  (I did not get the Kindle Fire, which is more like a tablet because I read soooooo much and my eyes would feel the strain of a backlit screen.  E-ink is more eye-friendly if you're doing a lot of reading.)

I am in love with my new Kindle Touch.

It is sleeker, smoother, and smaller than my old Kindle.  The touch screen makes navigation and note-taking so much easier.  I used to have to navigate a page using a little nubby joystick thing which was slow and imprecise.  The touch screen replaces this and makes interacting with the page (scrolling, highlighting, note-taking) so much simpler.  I have yet to encounter any glitches (and I've been playing with it quite a bit!).  It is a glorious, beautiful device.  Plus the new screensavers are super pretty!  

No more creepy Emily Dickinson!

Hello pretty close-up shots of typewriters!

 

If you've been thinking about buying an e-reader, do it.  Best thing I ever did.