Review of Kindle Paperwhite with Case, Stand or Cover

Amazon Kindle Case, Duragadget Stand, Verso Marbled Blue Cover

When my 2010 Kindle died on the beach, I replaced it with the new Kindle Paperwhite ($139 with wifi and without advertising). This time I got a 2-year warranty to protect the fragile screen. Although I prefer reading real books at home, I like the Kindle for reading on the go and for digital galleys. I missed not having one when I was waiting for the new model to be released in October.

Low setting in Amazon case folded back

The Kindle Paperwhite has some good new features. The reader still uses e-ink, but it has added a built in light for night time reading. The sharper text is illuminated sideways to avoid the eye fatigue of backlit screens. The lit screen appears bright white like paper, but you can adjust the lighting so the screen looks more like newsprint or the old Kindle. Unlit is easiest on the eye, but it's nice to have options. I thought I'd miss the old physical keyboard, but the new touch screen one is easy to use and the menu simple to navigate. The Kindle Paperwhite is also smaller and thinner without losing any screen size.

High setting on Home Page in Amazon case open

Not all of the new features are improvements. I miss the old page turner buttons as it's too easy to skip a page accidentally with a touch screen. Another feature I dislike is the promotion of Amazon books on the home page (even in the "no advertising" models), but you can hide it by selecting to display "list view" instead of "cover view." All-in-all the pluses outweigh the negatives, but I wouldn't rush out and replace your old reader before it breaks. It bothers me that these ereader screens are so fragile. A book can last centuries.

Because the Paperwhite is smaller than the Kindle 3 with keyboard, I needed to purchase a new case. If you had the later generation Kindle touch model, you might be able to reuse your old case. I tested three covers which would suit different reading needs.

Amazon case is 1/2 inch; Durgadget stand and Verso cover are 1 inch thick approximately.

The least bulky, lightest weight and most protective cover is the Amazon Kindle one ($39.99 available in 7 colors). It has the added feature of a magnet closure that automatically turns the reader on and off. This is a big plus as the on-off botton is tiny and hard to use. The rigid edges protect the Kindle on all sides while leaving an opening for the charger. The design is nice but a bit corporate in feel with good quality leather. The cover bends back for easy hand held reading but doesn't work as a stand. There is one major design flaw: it's really difficult to get the device in and out of the case.

Adjustable Duragadget Stand

Since I like hands free reading, my personal favorite was the Duragadget Cover with Stand ($30.59 in 4 colors). It's adjustable and sturdy enough to sit in your lap while still providing good protection. Of all the cases I tested it was easiest to get the reader in and out of the case. It was also the cheapest. However the functional design and cheap leather were not especially attractive. I'm going to ask my daughter to decorate it with silver ink as a Christmas gift.

Verso cover folded back

For pure beauty I fell in love with Verso Marbled Blue cover ($39.99). The fake leather looks and feels real. The gorgeous Italian marbled paper design reminiscent of a journal bought in Florence. Even the spine has nice old book detailing. The biggest downside is the cover has no closure. Also it's extra bulky and awkward to hold when you bend the cover back (photo at right). It's best when held like a book in two hands. I'm tempted to keep this cover to dress up my Kindle just for fun.

The Kindle Paperwhite is only two months old so I suspect more cases will be designed to fit the new dimensions better, but these three were the best options I found so far. When I ordered a Kindle Paperwhite for my mom earlier this week, it was on backorder until December 19th. No wait for books at our local independent bookstore, and they shall outlast the Kindle by decades.

Reviewer's Disclaimer: all cases and the Kindle were purchased by me without compensation. I returned the cases I didn't like for a refund.

Life online: can you be over-connected?

Offline painting on Bailey Island earlier this autumn.

Although I can be quite social and outgoing, by nature I'm a hermit. When I write fiction, I disconnect from the internet and only answer phone calls from my children. The places where I paint my watercolors often lack cellphone reception, but that is a plus. Solitude allows me to slip into a meditative state of creative concentration. Still, as much as I need isolation to work, I crave social connection too. Face time is best, but the internet is useful for one who lives in a remote location.

Five years of blogging have lead me to new friends, who share my passion for books, nature and art. The view from my small town in Maine has broadened to foreign horizons. I've been introduced to new authors and toured beautiful gardens. A blog post is long enough to delve into a topic in depth and also allows interactive comments. Blogging is not the soapbox I feared it would be but an enlightened conversation. By meeting new people, whose paths wouldn't usually cross ours, we are forced to think outside the box and to consider different perspectives.

For years, blogging and email sufficed to maintain distant connections, but after Sandy struck, I lost contact even without losing power myself. I worried about friends and family in NYC and others in neighboring states. When emails remained unanswered, I joined Facebook and twitter to track down loved ones and blog buddies. Borrowed internet provided time for only a quick tweet or Facebook update, but it was enough to let me know they were okay. Technology is a marvel, a virtual campfire, as others have said. It warms our souls.

In the process of checking in with Sandy victims, I also reconnected with old friends, who had scattered all over the world. Many were now married with adorable children. As much as I dislike the needlessly complicated interface of Facebook and all the advertising, I now understand why people find it so addictive and forgo reading books. Limits will be key.

In some ways, I prefer the simplicity of twitter, but due to the public nature of tweets, it's better suited for work connections like my Linkedin account.


So now this Maine hermit is:

blogging,
tweeting,
updating on Facebook
and linking on Linkedin.
It's a 5-ring circus if you add
my website as a virtual art gallery.


Some have managed online multiplicity by posting simultaneously to all forums, but I don't think that approach usually works. Disconnect and redundancy happens. It looks unprofessional to whine about your kid's fever to business associates.

I'm concerned by how much personal information is out there for all to read. My guiding principle is to assume the last person I'd want to read my update will share it with a thousand clients. Think before posting.

Question: how do you manage this online cacophony and still find time for life offline?

Scout at Popham Beach last year.

Note: I'll be on blog vacation next week. Happy Thanksgiving! Next post on November 28th.

Feed by M.T. Anderson envisions the world through Google's glasses

Image from Google for the NYT

Feed was published ten years ago as fiction (for teens and adults), but the chilling future that M.T. Anderson predicted is now our near present. Google is developing eyeglasses to screen the internet…constantly. A contact lens version is in development, and Apple is working on wearable computers. Is this good innovation or a futuristic nightmare?

In Feed everyone, except the poor, has a computer chip embedded in the brain so that a live internet feed is constantly visible. The eyeball becomes the new computer screen. Pop-up banners, custom-tailored to the individual, encourage shopping. Memories can be shared like YouTube videos. Chatting is as easy as thinking, assuming anyone can think with all that distraction.

Titus, the teenaged boy narrator, explains:

“The braggest thing about the feed, the thing that made it really big, is that it knows everything you want and hope for, sometimes before you even know what those things are. It can tell you how to get them, and help you make buying decisions that are hard. Everything we think and feel is taken in by the corporations…”

“I don’t know when they first had feeds. Like maybe, fifty or a hundred years ago. Before that, they had to use their hands and their eyes. Computers were all outside the body. They carried them around outside of them, in their hands, like if you carried your lungs in a briefcase, and opened it to breathe.”

What I loved about Feed, beyond the fabulous writing, was how the new world is shown to us without interpretation. We hear adults and even the President speaking in jumbled slang like teenagers. A rare metaphor triggers a sweet love affair. As the world disintegrates into chaos with uprisings, vanishing suburbs and skin lesions, people keep shopping and partying. The rebel hackers who resist the feed appear to be lunatics. Or are they the only sane ones left?

Personally, I believe the danger isn’t in technology but in how we use it. Consider the ethical as well as the practical consequences of new technology... or while texting, you might walk into a bear. I bought a paperback copy of this book (without compensation) so that it would be easy to share with my family and add to our physical library. Perhaps in defiance of the feed mentality?

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@Barrie Summy

Traveling to Europe with Kindles

Elba Island, Italy at sunset

Before leaving for our one-month vacation to England and Italy, we gave our kids early birthday presents of Kindles. Since the Amazon account was in my name, all my ebooks were automatically archived on their Kindles. When I buy a new ebook, we can have it delivered to all three devices (or select just one) for no extra charge. This had the added advantage of being able to read one book simultaneously. The kids and I had many wonderful conversations over shared books, something I’d missed since they became independent readers.

Hill town of Elba Island

 Elba Island, Italy

The Kindles were great for travel! Our bags were much lighter, and we never ran out of reading material. Since the kids’ Kindles were wifi only, we had download books before leaving home. I also uploaded our itinerary and other important documents. Kindle did the conversion via email for free. Even abroad, I could download books anywhere with no surcharge via 3G on my Kindle and then transfer ebooks to the kids when we found wifi. Wifi connections in Europe were harder to come by, rarely free and often unreliable.

Beachside restaurant on Elba Island

Even my husband, who has an iPad2, covets a Kindle now. Mine was a gift from him. Kindles handle challenging light really well. Font size could be adjusted in dim light or if reading glasses were misplaced. You can even read outside without glare, just like a real book but unlike the iPad.

Figuring out how to charge our devices while abroad took some ingenuity. Kindle Help was not helpful but, I figured out that the Kindle’s charger would work in Europe with standard adapter plugs. We also got a car USB charger. The Kindle battery is meant to last a month with wifi/3G turned off, but on vacation we had to recharge about every 10 days. Reading more hours and using Amazon Kindle case reading lights ran the batteries down sooner.

Kindles should be ideal for travel guides. We could all simultaneously reference the Lonely Planet Guide to Italy without having to lug around the heavy 900-page guidebook. I used it to find affordable hotels and restaurants and to look up historical information on site. However, the maps were illegible and several links didn’t work. Then there were formatting issues: Kindles are designed for sequential reading, not for jumping around. Also, many guidebooks, like the Michelin ones, were not available on Kindle.

Only recently published books and classics (often for free!) are available. I had chosen the Kindle because it had the most titles of any ereader on the market, but it wasn’t enough. One of my favorite novels ever, A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth, would be perfect for the Kindle since it’s nearly 1,500 pages, but it was not available as an ebook. My 16-year-old son bought a used paperback copy at an English bookstore in Florence and lugged that brick off camping in the wilderness too. He’s my son!

There is an educational advantage to the Kindle’s limitations. Although my son figured out how to use his Kindle to get on Facebook, it was difficult to navigate without a real web browser.  This summer was spent offline.  Usually an X-box player, my son read more novels for fun on vacation than he had all year. His favorite ebook was The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer, 600-page historical fiction. To his surprise, he also liked Looking for Alaska by John Green. My son usually avoids young adult fiction, but he opened this favorite book of mine thinking it was a travel book. He got caught up in the story of a wild girl (called Alaska) and a thoughtful boy. He went on to read Paper Towns, also by John Green, but said it was too similar. On this trip, my son read more than me!

My 13-year-old daughter’s favorite ebooks were Beauty Queens by Libba Bray and the Dairy Queen trilogy by Catherine Gilbert Murdock, all in young adult fiction. My daughter liked the Kindle so much that she took hers to camp. Ereaders are allowed with Wifi off, but we’ll have to charge it on visiting day. I sent her with a few real books, as a back up.

Ereaders aren’t for everyone, but I suspect their popularity will rise as the publishing world adapts to the internet age. We’re getting a Kindle for my mother-in-law for Christmas since there are limited large print books at her public library. My mother, however, didn’t like the feel of a Kindle and preferred to lug real books around Italy.  Although I love my Kindle for travel, I still buy real books from independent bookstores to read at home.

Bookstore at Portoferraio, Elba Island

Related Posts:

Review of Kindle cases

Reading a Room with a View in Florence

Elba Island

Kindle 3 Cases Reviewed and Helpful Links for Kindle Users

Although I’ll always be a fan of real books, I love my new Kindle 3. Thank you, Henry, for the best Christmas gift! I’ll be using my Kindle for travel, for review galleys and to have in my handbag when I’m out of the house. I’ll still buy plenty of real books from independent bookstores to read at home and to give as gifts.

Why I chose a Kindle 3

I chose the Kindle over the Nook and iPad because of the larger number of titles (including free classics) available for Kindles and because the backlit screens on the other 2 devices are harder on the eyes. The Kindle screen looks just like regular paper. It did take a while to configure the settings to download ebooks from Amazon, but now it’s one click easy, taking only one minute.

The new Kindle has all the features I’ve been waiting for: visibility in bright sunlight (for beach reading), smaller and lighter (8.7 oz), and an ability to lend books (for 2 weeks.) The cost has come down too. My husband got me the 3G version ($189) so that I can download books anywhere and get newspapers daily while traveling. The cheaper version ($139) requires proximity to a Wifi network for downloads, but you don't need to be connected while reading.

Tip: to save batteries, disconnect from the WiFi when you’re not downloading books. Then the charge should last for a month.

Review of Kindle 3 Cases

Kindle Lighted Leather Cover, Duragadget Case with Adjustable Stand, Timbuk2 Envelope Sleeve

Choosing a Kindle was easy, but finding the right case was difficult. I tried out several cases, but none was perfect. The Kindle Lighted Leather Cover ($34.99, 15 oz, above left) has the best reading light. I like the colorful outside paired with a dark grey interior and secure Kindle clips. Unfortunately, the case is bulky, heavy and has a rough pebble grain in the leather. It would only be worth getting if you read in dim lighting or crave a hardcover book feel. This cover negates the advantage of a lightweight Kindle over a book.

The Timbuk2 Envelope Sleeve ($25, 4.2 oz, above right) and Flapjacket ($40, 6.4 oz, not shown) are both lightweight, durable nylon and stylish, but the Envelope adds bulk plus noisy velcro and the Flapjacket is expensive. Neither one has a stand nor a light.

Of my sampling, Duragadget makes the most utilitarian and least expensive Kindle 3 case ($18.99, 10.6 oz, above center). This slim leather cover has an integral stand for hands-free reading. The red case is prettier but black was less distracting while reading. The stand was sturdy enough to rest on my lap or armchair. The stabilizer flips up to become a protective cover with a magnetic closure. The picture frame style stands from other companies (viewed online) looked like they wouldn’t balance as well on my lap. I wish the Duragadget had a reading light and a more attractive exterior, but it's still the best option. Thank you, dovegreyreader, for the recommendation.

Options Beyond These Cases: Skins/Decals, including one from Van Gogh, look cool but don’t protect the Kindle screen. At Wired I read about the cheapest case option: an ordinary 6X9 padded mailing envelope! Since the Kindle 3 is so new, there are bound to be more options later. Let me know in a comment if you find a better case.

Digital Galleys for Book Bloggers

As a book blogger, the main draw of a Kindle will be digital galleys. Advanced Reader Copies (also called galleys) are sent free to reviewers like me at high cost to the publishers (more than a finished hardcover book.) ARCs are full of typos and formatting errors so are not worth saving or passing onto others. Frequently publishers run out of popular ARCs and leftovers can’t be sold. It makes a lot of sense to switch ARCs to digital galley format. Go to Netgalley to request free digital galleys from publishers for review purposes.

Useful Links for Kindle Users

The Story Siren, a hub for YA book bloggers, asked her readers to share useful links for Kindle users:

The Social Frog gave the link to Kindle Boards
Catherine gave the link to The Kindle Lending Club on Facebook
Gaby shared the link to a similar lending club at Goodreads
Elizabeth checks eReader IQ daily for posts on free ebooks, price drops and new titles
Anna recommended Books on The Knob for free ebooks

Thank you, Story Siren and commenters!
Do you have more tips or helpful links? Please comment below and I'll add a link here:

David Cranmer commented with a link to Project Gutenberg with 33,000 free ebooks for all ereaders.

What I’m reading and not yet noting on my Kindle:

I like to read the book before seeing the movie spin off. I loved Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day, both the novel (1989) and the movie (1993). Unfortunately my local independent bookstore was sold out of Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go (2005) which is now a movie too. I didn’t want to order the latest paperback edition because I dislike movie tie-in covers so I downloaded the ebook for $5 after sampling the first chapter for free.

It’s perfect reading a futuristic story like Never Let Me Go on a new age ereader. I don’t know what page I’m on, but the Kindle remembers my place. It shows my location by line and percent (25%) of book. Just a few chapters in, I’m very much enjoying my first ebook.

Still, I prefer the feel of a real book and the ease of scribbling notes in the margins. The Kindle allows you to highlight, bookmark and type margin notes, but I haven't figured that out yet. I'm not sure why someone else's highlights are appearing automatically in the text. Very distracting. I know, RTFM. There is a manual pre-installed on my Kindle only I need to read it first before I can skip to the relavent section. Sigh. Good project for a snowy day.

Reviewer’s Disclaimer: I was not paid to review any of the above products. The Kindle was a gift from my husband, and I bought the ebook and cases to sample. I kept the Duragadget case and returned the others.

Storm Watch: a blizzard is due later today with up to a foot of snow predicted. We're thrilled because Maine has had less snow than usual and we're well set up to deal with it. The storms have all gone south and wrecked havoc. My son's first two Nordic ski races were cancelled due to lack of cover, even up north in the mountains. Ironically his race was cancelled today due to the storm. We'll be skiing out back in the woods. I love a snow day as long as we don't lose power.