I was so excited to get my hands on the Sony Digital Reader, give it a spin and tell you all what I thought of it. When I supervised the media department at a public library after college, we were always talking about the latest technology in video, music and book readers. This was about 5 years ago and digital books were out there in the market but none of them truly felt like you were reading a book. I thought they’d never catch on.
For a few years now I’ve had the scriptures and a few other books uploaded to my PDA and it’s great for quick reference but not particularly enjoyable to use and I don’t want to feel like I’m reading from a computer. I wanted to review the Sony Reader Digital Book so I could tell you how the technology was coming along and all the reasons it wasn’t good enough.
Well, that was a couple of months ago. The reader showed up at my house and I pulled it out of the box and started using it immediately. And it feels like a book. It’s small and lightweight and the screen is such that it looks like paper, truly. The font and spacing feel like a paperback except that you can CHANGE the font size. I like to keep it somewhere between itty bitty Lord of the Rings font and granny-needs-glasses large print.
There’s no backlight, which may seem like a downside, but what book glows? Not this one. It’s really like you’re reading from paper, only it always saves your place, you can fit hundreds of books in one small device, and most importantly you don’t have that lopsided page flipping problem. You know when you’re lying on your side reading and one side is always more comfortable to lay on, depending on how far along you are in the book and whether you’re reading the left or right page? But then you switch to the other page and you have to flip over on your other side or hold the book in some really weird way?
You don’t have to do that with this book. It is never lopsided and there are buttons on both sides to turn the pages.
If you’re looking for an all-in-one digital blog reader and wireless device, this is not the toy for you. But that’s not what I’m looking for. I’m looking for this. It does also have a black and white picture viewer, an MP3 player, and two storage card slots so you can use it to store and use a TON of media. You can even play music while you read.
It has a long battery life and the screen is viewable even in direct sunlight… like… I don’t know… a book!
There are a few negatives. The books do load slower than I’d like because you know, I like it fast. The software interface for downloading and uploading books is not super user-friendly. I fancy myself somewhat of a techie and I had some trouble figuring out how to get the books on the device the first time. There is no way to use the book while it is plugged in your computer to charge and you have to buy the DC power adapter separately, which I would highly recommend. Sony also doesn’t have the greatest selection of books in the world. They have a good amount of classic titles and a lot of new releases but the selection is not as broad as that for the Amazon Kindle.
However, I prefer the Sony reader to what I’ve seen of the Kindle because I want a book, a real book, but better. I hope they continue to grow their inventory of content.
I waited weeks to do this review because I’m so enjoying using it and because of my advertising contract now I must pass it on to one of you. So weighing in at a retail value of $299.00, I give you the Sony Reader Digital Book. It also comes with 100 free classic titles from Shakespeare to George Eliot.
Now does anyone want to give me one? It’s on my wish list. Oh the joys of carrying my entire library around all the time!
If you’re willing to enter this giveaway, even though the reader is lightly used and has my cooties on it, leave a comment listing 2 non-religious books you’d like to carry around with you everywhere. I know you all love the Bible and the Koran. What else do you love? (I’m willing to ship within the US. Anywhere else, I’ll be happy to send it if you pay the postage.)
I’ll randomly choose a winner Sunday night at 10pm PST. Oh, and Sony wants me to let you know that they’re not responsible if you fall and hurt yourself while reading it or if it self-destructs when you disassemble it to see the little men turning the gears on the inside.
oh… my hubs wants the sony. 🙂 sign me up. He got me the kindle for my birthday and it’s great for me but it has its little quirks too, but yeah, my hubs would love this, and maybe he’d stop stealing my kindle!
Oh, how exciting! Please add me to the list of hopeful winners. I couldn’t care less that it was used… almost everything I own is used! Anyway, let me see… 2 non-religious books I carry with me … Persuasion by the one and only Jane Austen, and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, which I finally just read for the first time.
BTW, your comment about the LoTR font cracked me up!
Oh boy would I love one of these! Let’s see… what books would I love on there? not sure! I think I would carry… really, I have no idea! I read a LOT and don’t really have favorites… Sorry about that! I do enjoy me some good chick “fluff” every once in a while, though!
Two books that I would carry with me where ever I go…. I try to read a new book every week or two, but I absolutely love (and have reread dozens of times) Ken Follet’s “Pillars of the Earth”, and I would love to carry the complete works of Shakespeare (especially in electronic format!), just to flip through.
Oooh, I’d love to have it!
Two books: The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver and The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitxgerald.
Please, please pick me! We’re stationed over in Germany (we have a US mailing address though!) and it’s so hard for me to find good books here without it taking a million years to order them from an online book store. Plus, I have a toddler; something that saves my place would be invaluable!
I remember 15 years ago when my 12th grade English teacher said “In 10 years you will be reading books on computer.” Not a one of us believed anyone they would invent it, much less anyone would have any desire to do that. I sure hope he invested in one of these companies.
War and Peace and Anna Karenina
I’m kidding. Whoo boy, I crack myself up.
I should say a medical encyclopedia and an herbal reference book, because how practical would that be? Instead I’ll say and two Jane Austen books and if the kids get bit or stung I’ll tell them to suck it up until the next chapter.
We were just talking about this last weekend and I decided that my two desert island books are To Kill A Mockingbird and Travels with Charley. I’ve re-read both a zillion times already and find something new every time.
Great giveaway!! Fingers crossed!
That is so interesting – I have heard of these digital books, but never actually seen one. Huh. Not sure what I think since I do love paper books. I would love to try it out though 🙂
Anyway, 2 books I would carry around:
To Kill a Mocking Bird
Harry Potter (series, is that allowed?)
OOooo… cool gadget! I’d love to give this to my dad. I wonder how much international posting would cost though.
Books I’d love to carry around everywhere? One of Shel Silverstein’s book because I love his poetry and another would be Pretty Little Mistakes because there’s so many stories in that one! 😛
How fun! Just TWO books, huh? Let’s see…anything by Shannon Hale (maybe Princess Academy?) and anything by Dr. Seuss (the Foot Book rules!).
I have to agree with the Harry Potter series. But I’m assuming you’re looking for new reading. So I’ll say Eat, Pray, Love and Life’s Golden Ticket.
Oh, I have so wanted one of these for soooo long! I have it on my Christmas list so we’ll see but if I won it here that would be so much better. Well, I have like 200 books on my To Read list on Good Reads but I would say that right now the TWO books I really want to read are: The Kite Runner and Twilight! Thanks!
Wow – this sounds cool! Like you, I never thought I would be interested because I love the physical qualities of books, but
I’d love to try it!
My book picks would be “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” by Barbara Kingsolver, and “Eat Pray Love” by Elizabeth Gilbert – I have listened to the CD versions of both books over and over, as well as reading them.
Thanks – hope you get your own Sony reader for your birthday or something!
Steph
Oooh, good question. I would definitely carry around Pride and Prejudice since it’s one of the books I re-read every couple of years. And let’s see….hmmmm….also Heartbreak Hotel by Anne Rivers Siddons.
I hope I win. 🙂
oh wow!
i’m currently reading a big stack of library books that i would love to return and read on this Sony Reader 😉
so i’ll say “My Life in France” by Julia Child and “The Art of Simple Food” by Alice Waters
I’m going to be the nerd of the group…
I would carry around Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky. I think I am the only person in my high school English class that actually read (and enjoyed) this book. The discussions were not so, umm, discussing…
I would also carry, Please Baby Please, by Spike Lee. It’s a children’s book and it’s awesome. One of my toddler’s favorites. It’s the kind of book that we now can recite together even when we don’t have the book, you know the kind… but it’s just a cute story and if it could come on anytime, like toddler on demand, that would be awesome.
Yay! I can’t wait to hear who wins!
What a tough question! One book would definitely be a grammar reference book. The other? Hmmm…I think a book of great short stories to I’d always have something to read while waiting at the Dr. office, etc.
I am a children’s book junkie, and narrowing it down to two was tough. But I guess something from Roald Dahl and anything from the Little House series would keep me plenty happy for awhile. Oh, but “I Sold My Dad for Two Goldfish” by Neil Gaiman is a classic to. BTW, Laylee would love that book, she’d like “Wolves in the Walls” by the same author. Why didn’t those ever wind up on Reading Rainbow?
Oh my word! I’m so excited! This is so nifty!
Up until a year or so ago, I was a prolific reader. A little while after I got married and moved 6 hours away from my parents (and my dad stopped handing me book after book to read), I stopped reading new material. I got caught up in sharing my old book loves with my new husband. We’re still working our way through my collection but with the general beat down that day-in, day-out work/life gives us, we haven’t found as much (or any!) time lately to sit down and read.
I used to carry a book with me everywhere to read during downtime – then I started getting sciatic pain and my husband (somewhat strongly) encouraged me to get smaller and smaller purses. For some reason he was convinced that carrying two tons around at all times was unhealthy. My book companions have been lost in the mix. I would love to have a digital reader that carried all sorts of books at my fingertips, how cool is that!!
Two books I would personally carry around are probably Songmaster by Orson Scott Card and Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.
If you’re asking for us to list 2 books because you want suggestions for reading material that will ignite your imagination and will be difficult to put down then check out the following: Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card, God-Shaped Hole by Tiffanie DeBartolo, Alanna by Tamora Pierce (For younger readers, my guilty pleasure book), Druids by Morgan Llewelyn or Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey.
Here’s to the possibility of no future paper cuts!
It is hard to pick, but I think that I would love to carry around Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion both by Jane Austen. That way I have books that I love with me and I also look smart for picking a classic.
I’d put “The Stand” and any James Michener book on it. I have re-read The Stand several times and my hands always get tired of holding the book because it is so big!
What a great give-away! Thank you so much!
Melissa in FL
nnisigning@gmail.com
This device sounds amazing and since I don’t mind cooties, I’ll enter the contest and say that my two books would be Gone With the Wind (amazing book, better than the movie, which was fantastic!) and Catch-22 (life according to the dangerously sane, which describes me). But to be perfectly honest, I couldn’t just carry two books with me all the time.
Oh how lovely, I have been eyeing these!
Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls (all time favorite book as a child)
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
I’m TOTALLY with you on reading on your side when your either beginning or almost finishing a long book! 🙂
I’d have to go with Villette, by Charlotte Bronte, and maybe Pride and Prejudice.
I would LOVE to try this out. I’ve always got a book slung into my purse and usually another one in the glove box, too. My two books… Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver and probably Pride and Prejudice, too.
At this stage in my life it would likely be “kitty says meow” and “skippyjohn jones.” Can you tell I have kids?
Books are the best invention….and if I could take all my favorite books with me… and be able to read on my one side while deftly holding my book and then flip over and STILL deftly hold my book…why that would be even better!!
I would love to be considered for this giveaway. My two (you’re gonna limit me to two?) favorite books that I would have to carry around with me everywhere are: Outlander by Diana Gabaldon (I bought this book about 8 years ago, and have the whole series-there are 6 books with at least one more on the way), and Beacon at Alexandria by Gillian Bradshaw (again, I’ve re-read this one about a zillion times)
Um.. could you enter me 10 times, cuz I really want this 🙂
Oh sign me up! My OCDness would love 100 books in one LOL! 2 non-religious books though . . . umm . . . umm . . . probably Happy Housewives by Darla Shine, and The Surrendered Wife.
I’ve downloaded books on tape to my mp3 player from my library’s website and thought I was SO tech-savvy, and now this comes along!
My two books: the Lord Peter collection by Dorothy Sayers (every short story with Lord Peter Wimsey in it), and The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I go back to both of these every year or so.
Good question. I think I would keep a copy of “The Secret Garden” with me forever. Also, “Rebecca” by Daphne de Maurier. That book has it all.
I have to delurk for this giveaway, although I’m still hesitating a little because of the challenge of choosing only two books. I think one would have to be The Once and Future King by TH White, and the other a book of poetry, but this is harder to narrow down. Hmm… I don’t know if such a thing exists, but I’m going to choose a possibly imaginary poetry anthology including the likes of Plath, Neruda, Cummings, Angelou, Atwood, Eliot, Whitman, Louise Gluck, Audre Lord, Adrienne Rich, and many others.
What an amazing giveaway!
Ohhhh how to choose!
I guess I would have to go with Candide and Pride&Prejudice…
or maybe Anne of Green Gables….or…
That’s such a tough one. It’s a good thing it holds more than 2 books!
A big book of quotations and The Complete Works of A.A.Milne – something for me to read in short snippets and to always be ready for a quick story time with the kids.
Oh, what a great thing! Between this and my audiobooks on my ipod I would be set for LIFE! My two books would be Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers and The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.
I’ve been skeptical about the “feel” of this type of product, but your review sounds great! My two books? Little Women and Anne of Green Gables.
Oh my. Ben is dying to get his hands on some sort of like reader. So if I win, I will be his favorite wife ever! I mean, I am his only wife, of course. But then even if I die and he gets a new wife, she would never be better than me, so, come on big money!!!
The two books I would carry around are: Pride and Prejudice by Jane, and The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
Wow, what a giveaway!!
Pride and Prejudice and … I don’t know. Whoever said Persuasion, probably that too. Jane Austen just stands up really well to rereading. I can go back to her over and over, and still enjoy her wit.
I would love to give this a try. Carry around 200 books, Wow!
I would say 2 must haves would be…. All the Jane Austen books, maybe some Dickens and Gaskell. Harry Potter is always good. Oh.. Jane Eyre. Anne of Green Gables and anything else written by Montgomery. Oh… I can’t only think of two.
What two books *would* I want to carry around constantly? Geez. I’ve heard people say that choosing their favorite book is like choosing a favorite child, but since I only have one kid, choosing books is much harder…
I think I’ll go with the complete Emily Dickinson (the newer one) and something by Michael Ondaatje.
Thanks for the review–and the giveaway!
OMG! I love love love Harry Potter. I know that it’s cheesy and they are entirely too big to carry around 24/7 but any of those and also the nicholas sparks books. They make me laugh and cry and leave me a oh so good feeling inside.
OH, my dh would LOVE this….I think I would want “To Kill a Mockingbird” & “The Hiding Place” by Corrie Ten Boom
Oooh I am with Mary, Harry Potter and To Kill a Mockingbird.
I’m outing myself here as a Walgreen’s book reader, but I love anything by James Patterson and with a young teen in the house, I’m enjoying “Mama Rock’s Rules”. I’ve got a lot to learn.
It is so hard to narrow it down to two. I love books and I love owning books.
The two favorites that I have read this year are Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace . . . One School at a Time by Greg Mortensen and David Oliver Relin and Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale (one of my favorite young adult fiction writers.)
This thing looks cool. I read in bed every night and the turning part really gets me 🙂 My two books would be 1) A good cookbook…right now I’m digging the one by Katie Lee Joel. 2) Gorgeously Green. I actually pick it up several times a day to reference things so it would be handy to have it on my person all of the time.
I was struggling with a book in bed this morning. I like to lay on my side and read as well.
I have downloaded some books from i-tunes to my i-pod and listened to them for convenience but I miss the pages and the re-reading certain parts. I think one of these handy-dandies would be great.
I think two books that I could read over and over are Persuasion by Jane Austen and Kane and Abel by Jeffrey Archer.
I have found myself in some very strange contorted positions while trying to read a book in bed. Reading in one of my favoritest things in the whole wide world, so I always have a book close at hand to read after the kids are in bed… or napping… or playing together peaceably without grabbing toys from each other or poking each other in the eyeballs. Anyway, “At the Back of the North Wind” by George MacDonald and “Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Bronte are two of my all-time favorites!
I need to read The Blue Sword and The Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley every year. And Robin Hobbs books are wonderful too! Hmmmm I think I have a thing for writers named Robin!
i’d pick diary of Anne Frank and Pride and Prejudice