Reading and E-Books

We spend a lot of our time reading. We read while camping, in the rain, waiting in line or anywhere one has to spend time in quiet contemplation. We both have e-readers that are small, light and easy to transport anywhere. These hold hundreds of books, so we always have books at our fingertips without spending a lot of storage space on them.

We discovered e-readers a few months ago and unloaded several large boxes of paper books! We love it!

First and foremost, I read the bible, aiming for daily. I also sometimes listen to it while doing handiwork (painting, crocheting, sewing, etc.) Another thing I like about e-books is that I can listen to books and music with headphones.

My most recent find in other, worldly books was Henry David Thoreau's "Walden". I knew what it was about and had many people quote parts of it to me and comment to me that "Thoreau would be proud", but I had not actually read his book until now.

He sets forth his feelings, philosophy and the interesting parts in the first half of the book, much of which I liked and agreed with. I found the second half to be quite boring, not so much due to dry facts but just to the very slow and pointless progress of it. I highlighted almost all of the first half of the book, so in agreement was I with his assessment and opinion of society in detail. Now that I have finished reading Thoreau, I am going to start "Crime and Punishment" by Dostoevsky. I'm not too sure how that's going to go...

Some other books that I want to read are the philosophies of Plato and Socrates, as well as the classics like "Treasure Island" and "David Copperfield". I have a long list of books like this to start on. I read all of these in high school English Lit class, but that was so many decades ago!

I only read fiction when I am not researching more interesting information. Lately I have been devoting my time to reading and researching wild edibles in BC. I plan to forage as soon as spring gets here!

I have recently decided to spend my reading time profitably when possible, leaving the drivel until I need to relax, mindlessly, to recover from stress. (I don't need that very often in our new lifestyle.) When reading mindless drivel, I like Louis L'Amour :-)

I do not like to read or watch highly emotional dramas (especially with people whining) or mushy, often embarrassing romances or stupid, mindless and embarrassing comedies or supernatural, spiritual with witches or ghosts or stories about psycho killers kidnapping and torturing people or real life stories of other peoples lives (just not interested). I only like action-adventure, mysteries, disasters and non-fiction how-to books. (Yes, I know, I'm very picky...) This is not necessarily due to being a Christian, but mostly just personal preference. It's just me :-)

In the mean time, I'm enjoying the classics! Have you read them since you were in school?