When I was young, I literally devoured books. Science fiction from Asimov, Heinlein and Clarke, cold war thrillers from Forsyth and Clancy, historical sagas from Clavell and Michener; and of course electronic books like Forrest Mims and the Howard W Sams series.
Eventually progressing to a well endowed technical library, which I frequently use when attempting to answer some of the confusing posts here.
The last books I actually purchased were all nonfiction historical books.

That was then, about 8 years ago. No more book purchases from me.
Nowadays I always check out books from my local public library, although their stock is now constantly dwindling. When I queried a librarian, she told me nowadays nobody is checking out books anymore, and the city has severely reduced the library’s budget.

Thus my form of visual entertainment has been reduced mostly to screens, namely phone screens.
How about you? Do you still purchase and read books?

 

I love to read. But nowadays I only buy ebooks. They're much more convenient to read in my Kindle. Especially since one is allowed to make notes, bookmarks and even share a small portion of their content. Plus, I can make backups of most of them so they will never ever get lost. Even if I were to lose my Kindle itself.

On the downside, I miss the experience of going to the bookstore and walk among its isles, just looking at the titles and covers. And sitting at their small cafés while enjoying a good read

 

I used to buy a couple dozen paperbacks a year. I don't know when the last time I bought one was, but I haven't bought more than three or four in the last five years (since we moved). In the ten years before that (since the prior move), I doubt I bought more than twenty. The ones I have are still in the boxes from when I moved from that prior house.

I am also a voracious reader. It wasn't until a friend in junior high school gave me a Christmas present of Heinlein's Rocket Ship Galileo. It literally changed my life. I now own about a thousand paperback books, all of which I have read and many of which I have read multiple times -- a handful have been read more than ten times. Until very recently, I also owned over 1300 technical books. I've recently donated over a thousand of them to Goodwill, hoping someone else gets as much use out of them as I did, but it is time for me to acknowledge that I am moving to a new chapter in my life and need to get rid of stuff. That will likely happen to the majority of my paperbacks as well, which will be sad because when I would look over the shelves I would briefly re-enter the worlds contained within those covers just by seeing the titles on the spines. That's one thing that I can't get and will miss when most of what I have will be e-books.

I hate electronic technical books. Being able to search is a definite plus, particularly as auto-generated indices have become increasingly useless. There is also a value in compactness -- thirteen hundred text and technical books took up a LOT of room! But those are about it. I can navigate through a textbook, particularly one I have become familiar with, quickly and efficiently. I don't write in books, not even my name, so I don't have the benefit of highlighted text and margin notes, but I don't think my learning style would actually get much benefit from that, anyway. I'm not as adverse to electronic pleasure books, since I don't interact with them as reference books, so I've become much more comfortable with them, though I can't say I prefer them just yet.

And, boy, how I miss the bookstores! I used to go to the mall just so that I could wander through Walden's Books and B. Dalton, Bookseller stores. Latter is was Mackenzie White and then Borders and Barnes and Noble. All are gone (at least here) except Barnes and Noble, but it is a shadow, in terms of books, of its former self. Libraries are the same thing -- few deserve the name any more, including campus libraries. I so understand the trends and the pressures and, in their place, I would almost certainly be doing the same things, however reluctantly. But we are losing something that yet more screen time can't replace.

 

I still read my dog-eared paper-back copy of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged at least twice a year.

It becomes more prescient over time, long after her death, and even longer since she wrote it in the 1940s to 1950s.

Everything else is Kindle.

 

There is something magical about cuddling with an actual book, that looking at a screen cannot match.
I cannot really point at the exact cause, it is just...there.

But I fully understand their disadvantages. They are heavy. They take a lot of space.
Now that my children have firmly planted their roots elsewhere, my wife and I have decided that it is time to downsize our home. Among many other things, it means discarding books, which I have started doing.

And as I go one by one, deciding what stays and what goes, me, just like W mentioned, remember what each book title taught me, the feelings and emotions of sharing time together, and then like a departed friend, with a last look I let them go.

Very emotional. Unless one is a book lover, one cannot really understand the feeling.

 

I was a pretty heavy reader as a child starting with comic books before I even started school. As a preschool child Dad and I would read the serial stories together each week in the Saturday Evening Post. Read all the Hardy Boy books as a child plus many others and then heavily into science fiction even into college. After college most of the popular pulp fiction author's novels and even some of the wife's Nora Roberts novels. Then too busy with raising children and career. Most of my reading turned to technical books, textbooks, reference books, and studies related to supporting my Process Control and Computerization needs at work. Spent a fair bit of reading and study also with structural steel construction, foundations, architectural standards, southern building code, lightning suppression and protection, the National Electrical Code, computer operating systems, programming languages, and other such work-related needs. I did add a few pulp novels here and there but not very many per year if at all. Since retiring it has been related to my electronics studies mostly and electronics related to amateur radio. I prefer books but have over 50 Gb of books on my computer now as well. Kinda nice to use a search engine at times instead of flipping pages to find something. One thing that I have on my computer is the Encyclopedia Britannica's Great Books of the Western World in 54 hard bound volumes and first published in the 50s I think but now out of print. There is also available a children's set of them as well with youth literature mostly and designed for a lower grade reading level. Look it up if you don't know about it. Was advertised as a 10-year reading program and there used to even be reading clubs that would get together for discussing them. I never got that far into them, but they are a compendium of the Western Civilization's best literary and scientific works starting from the Greek classis. As well as its Syntopicon which "contains 102 essays introducing readers to the great ideas as these are discussed in the Great Books". Which can be found for free on the net of bought used as a complete set for ~300USD and up (1,700USD on Amazon) depending on condition. I have them on my tablet and spend time reading them when on vacation or traveling. 5.7Gb for the lot. Far more pages and shelf space than the Encyclopedia Britannica itself. A couple of shelves in most bookcases.

 

I'm an avid reader and still prefer printed books. Before the Covid pandemic, I went to the library a couple times a month. Since then, I've only gone to the library about once a year.

Pre-covid, I bought dozens of books at library sales to build up my library due to dwindling availability at the library. When I found that they were reducing their Anne McCaffrey selections (love the Dragon Riders of Pern series), I started buying them (and other McCaffrey series) and several other authors (Jack Campbell, Elizabeth Moon, Jean Johnson, Jody Nye, Asimov, Clarke, Niven, Ben Bova, EE Doc Smith).

I buy mostly used books from Goodwill and Abebooks.

There were a couple of book series that my Mother-In-Law bought for me (hard covers). I reread one 3 book series by Nora Roberts last week.

In a pinch, I'll download ebooks, but I still prefer actual books.

 

I have also been an avid reader from as far back as I can remember , and still cannot break the habit, Still belong to the library .
I much prefer books, with a preference to true stories, also prefer the printed manual for a PC based utility program.
Youtube tutoriols are OK, just that there are those that just cannot produce one like a select few can.
On a related subject, A short while ago I read the story of Henrietta Lacks and the discovery of her immortal Hela cells.
Just recently my grand daughter graduated as a lab technician, one of the tests she did was using these immortal cells.

 

A short while ago I read the story of Henrietta Lacks and the discovery of her immortal Hela cells.

I read that book about three or four years ago. It's a fascinating story.

 

I read that book about three or four years ago. It's a fascinating story.

Was it this that tipped you off ?
https://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/threads/hela-cells-good-read.125289/

 

I used to buy a couple dozen paperbacks a year. I don't know when the last time I bought one was, but I haven't bought more than three or four in the last five years (since we moved). In the ten years before that (since the prior move), I doubt I bought more than twenty. The ones I have are still in the boxes from when I moved from that prior house.

I am also a voracious reader. It wasn't until a friend in junior high school gave me a Christmas present of Heinlein's Rocket Ship Galileo. It literally changed my life. I now own about a thousand paperback books, all of which I have read and many of which I have read multiple times -- a handful have been read more than ten times. Until very recently, I also owned over 1300 technical books. I've recently donated over a thousand of them to Goodwill, hoping someone else gets as much use out of them as I did, but it is time for me to acknowledge that I am moving to a new chapter in my life and need to get rid of stuff. That will likely happen to the majority of my paperbacks as well, which will be sad because when I would look over the shelves I would briefly re-enter the worlds contained within those covers just by seeing the titles on the spines. That's one thing that I can't get and will miss when most of what I have will be e-books.

I hate electronic technical books. Being able to search is a definite plus, particularly as auto-generated indices have become increasingly useless. There is also a value in compactness -- thirteen hundred text and technical books took up a LOT of room! But those are about it. I can navigate through a textbook, particularly one I have become familiar with, quickly and efficiently. I don't write in books, not even my name, so I don't have the benefit of highlighted text and margin notes, but I don't think my learning style would actually get much benefit from that, anyway. I'm not as adverse to electronic pleasure books, since I don't interact with them as reference books, so I've become much more comfortable with them, though I can't say I prefer them just yet.

And, boy, how I miss the bookstores! I used to go to the mall just so that I could wander through Walden's Books and B. Dalton, Bookseller stores. Latter is was Mackenzie White and then Borders and Barnes and Noble. All are gone (at least here) except Barnes and Noble, but it is a shadow, in terms of books, of its former self. Libraries are the same thing -- few deserve the name any more, including campus libraries. I so understand the trends and the pressures and, in their place, I would almost certainly be doing the same things, however reluctantly. But we are losing something that yet more screen time can't replace.

Wow I thought I had a lot of books!

 

Was it this that tipped you off ?
https://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/threads/hela-cells-good-read.125289/

Lol ... that was nine years ago! ... time flies when one's having fun ...

 

When I was young, I literally devoured books. Science fiction from Asimov, Heinlein and Clarke, cold war thrillers from Forsyth and Clancy, historical sagas from Clavell and Michener; and of course electronic books like Forrest Mims and the Howard W Sams series.
Eventually progressing to a well endowed technical library, which I frequently use when attempting to answer some of the confusing posts here.
The last books I actually purchased were all nonfiction historical books.

That was then, about 8 years ago. No more book purchases from me.
Nowadays I always check out books from my local public library, although their stock is now constantly dwindling. When I queried a librarian, she told me nowadays nobody is checking out books anymore, and the city has severely reduced the library’s budget.

Thus my form of visual entertainment has been reduced mostly to screens, namely phone screens.
How about you? Do you still purchase and read books?

I'm pleased you brought this up.

I very rarely read books anymore, a sad state of affairs. As a kid I was immersed in books, encyclopedias, astronomy, birds, birds eggs, all sorts. I still have some of my childhood books. Then I began to study mathematics and physics and later electronics. I loved used book stores too, I have all sorts of old science books, some 100 years old or more.

But since I got a tablet as a gift (15 years or more), it has come to replace books, especially when in bed. So I read books very rarely, my problem though is I still buy books as if I was an avid reader so I have a lot of unread books now.

Ancient Egypt, science, biographies, math, philosophy, theology, extra canonical scripture, metaphysics, science fiction, a huge assortment.

I excitedly order them, then when they arrive I thumb through them, and put them somewhere, never quiet getting to the point of actually reading it.

I bought a wonderful modern edition of Newton's Principia two years ago, I see it's spine every time I enter my office, but yet to actually read it!

I think the last book I actually read thoroughly was about Seymour Cray and the rise of supercomputers, like ten years ago.

 

I have purchased and read over 1000 books since Amazon Prime started, and probably read another 500 on Amazon Prime Unlimited (borrow for free.)

I typically read 2-4 books per week.

 

I have purchased and read over 1000 books since Amazon Prime started, and probably read another 500 on Amazon Prime Unlimited (borrow for free.)

I typically read 2-4 books per week.

That's impressive, I'm jealous.

 

That's impressive, I'm jealous.

Retirement is lovely.

 

Yes, back in the day the wife and I regularly bought boxes of books from the library throw-outs sales (wife was on the library board) and used paperback books from stores as well. Haven't been into the local Books-A-Million in years though so not even sure it it's still there... I still have some of my grandfather's steam railroad & machinery and electrical equipment books from early `1900s, great-grandfather's medical books from mid to late 1800s, as well as some of my Scottish emigree great-great-grandfather's steam engineering & machinery books from the late 1700s to early 1800s published in England and brought with him to the US as a young engineer. As well as some of my dad's old mechanical and marine engineering books. I kept his 1950 4th edition Marks Mechanical Engineering Handbook in my office at work and used it often looking things up. It sits now on the bookshelf behind me in my office at home, but its binding is getting ragged from use and rarely used now. Never enough books but I've run out of bookshelves so quite a few boxed up that are mostly collector's items... I hate to part with them as nowadays most are bought to simply cut the old engraved illustrations out of them to frame and hang simply as decorations on the wall. Sinful...

 

In hindsight, with digital media having almost completely vanquished printed newspapers and magazines, the book is the last significant use of ink and paper and thus its slow demise should not surprise anyone.
Gutenberg would be amazed!

 

In hindsight, with digital media having almost completely vanquished printed newspapers and magazines, the book is the last significant use of ink and paper and thus its slow demise should not surprise anyone.
Gutenberg would be amazed!

What worries me is, how will History be recorded from now on? Books and other artifacts can be verified and traced through multiple physical characteristics. Heck, even the presence of spores embedded in their pages can hint at where they've been, for instance.

Not so with digital information. Historical facts can be altered or completely erased, endangering the very source of Truth.

 

Lol ... that was nine years ago! ... time flies when one's having fun ...

The trouble is that it increases exponentially as you age !!