Introducing the Amazing Kindle From Amazon

It was a dark and dreary night as I fell asleep, dreaming of dragons, fairies, and dark things, brought on no doubt from the book I was reading before bed. As I wake from my dreamy night I make coffee, take a shower, and then I check the mail box. There it was! That great big white box.

Oh, my gosh, it's here! It's HERE! My Kindle! Oh, my Kindle is finally here! Not waiting until I go into the house, I tear open the package at the curb and take out my beautiful white Kindle and turn it on. It works! I immediately start reading Anne McCraffrey's Changelings: Book One of The Twins of Petaybee book. I just sat down on the curb and spend about half an hour reading. Now Ohmy and I are the best of friends. I take him everywhere. If you don't have a Kindle, get one! If you like to read, as I do, and are tired of carrying around several books at a time, then buy a Kindle.

If you like gadgets and even if you don't, buying a Kindle will sooth your savage brow, lighten your life, bring the greatest joy into your life, or it will just make you happy! Happy you can read the news with your morning coffee and not have to look for the paper in your shrubs. That paperboy!

Have a favorite magazine? It can be waiting for you in the mornings when you wake up. The Kindle is wireless so everything you like to read can be there waiting for you to turn it on and start reading. No more lugging newspapers, magazines, or books around with you.

Have a report from work to read? Put it on your Kindle and away to work you go. Order a book from Amazon, at the Kindle store, and within seconds you can be reading it. The Kindle is the latest, greatest, newest gadget on the market. Well, it is a couple of months old. You will wonder what you ever did without it.

We (Ohmy and I) recently went to the doctor's office and while we were waiting a lady and her two (very noisy) kids wanted to know what I was reading. I told them and then they wanted to know about Ohmy. I showed them how it works and then let the look at some of the pictures and listen to the MP3s I have and they fell in love with it. Funny, their mother didn't look to happy about it. Oh well... I finished the visit and went home.

I went back a couple a weeks later and the nurse told me the lady and her two kids came in the day before and they had a Kindle with them named Ricky and they did not "tear the place up", just sat in the chair and read on Ricky. She said it was the nicest, quietest visit she had with them. So it looks like a Kindle can also be a nice babysitter.

UPDATE: I again visited my doctors office and ran into these very nice quite little boys-both of them with Kindles now. Ricky and now Jackson. Both boys were sitting quietly reading and listening to some music on their Kindles.

The nurse told me they have changed all out of character since they got their Kindles. Their mother looked less stressed to. I asked the boys if they liked their Kindles and I got chapter and verse on what the Kindle can do and how I should get one...I guess they didn't remember who introduced them to the Kindle in the first place. And I thought I was important :)

First, download this program (It's FREE).

Kindle eBook Creator

Install it and open it. This is what I use to convert all my ebooks to read on Ohmy Kindle. It is very easy to use and it converts in seconds. So if you can get your hands on the PDF of your favorite book, just use Mobipocket Creator to convert it for you. I use it all the time and I do not have any problems reading them on Ohmy.

Here are some other sites that have some FREE ebooks you can download. Some of them are PDFs and some are all ready for your Kindle.

Munseys Free eBooks

This site has free ebooks for Kindle, and links to Mobipocket, Sony Reader, MSReader, and more. Worth a check see.

Feedbooks Free eBooks

"Feedbooks is a universal e-paper platform compatible with all e-paper devices where you can download thousands of free e-books, publish and share your own content, and create customized newspapers from RSS feeds and widgets." This is a pretty cool site.

A lot of the old classic here for the kids.


FictionWise Free eBooks

"Fictionwise is the top independent eBook seller in the world with tens of thousands of satisfied customers. We offer award-winning eBooks for all PDAs and PCs by top authors! Palm, PocketPC, Hiebook, eBookMan, Adobe, MS Reader, and WinCE eBooks. All new eBooks discounted each week! "

Remember you can get the PDFs and convert them using Mobipocket Creator

The Good: Excellent high-contrast 6" 800 x 600 screen display does a great job of simulating a printed page; built-in "Whispernet" data network--no PC needed; built-in keyboard for notes; 256MB internal storage; 3.5mm headphone jack; standard mini USB port; SD card expansion slot; long battery life and a Large library of tens of thousands of e-books, newspapers, magazines, and blogs via Amazon's familiar online store.

The Bad: Designed to be ergonomic, that is, designed for maximum comfort, efficiency or so says Amazon. But like all new products it does have a few downsides. The forward and back buttons could be a little smaller; when you pick up your Kindle you will always hit the buttons. After while you just know how to pick it up without hitting them. Some have complained about the cover but I do not have any problems with it. Others have also commented that the "web experience" leaves much to be desired. However, the Kindle is not a web browser. It can search the Internet but it's not a computer. I find when I run into a word I don't recognize I tell Ohmy to go see what it means and he returns the results. So again, the Kindle is not a web browser or computer but it will do web search. It comes in handy.

The Bottom Line:
You can make the transition to a Kindle rather quickly. The selection of books grows everyday and you can put hundreds on your Kindle. The beauty of a Kindle is everything you read is on one compact device. Your can put it down and when you pick it up again it's right where you left it. I highly recommend it to anyone who is an avid reader, take the plunge, Buy a Kindle! You won't be sorry.

By Steve Gibson

I was driven to write this review because it is somewhat distressing and, it seems to me, a bit unfair for the Kindle's average review rating to be dragged so far down by Kindle NON-OWNERS who, judging from their comments, seem to be quite annoyed by all of the positive comments about a device that's expensive, monochrome, not a general purpose media player, unable to leap tall buildings, or in some way less than they were expecting, wanting, or hoping. In contrast to non-owners, the people who actually HAVE Kindle's appear to universally love it, though with very valid caveats. I think of this as "The TiVo Effect" since, for the right sort of user, the Kindle will be life-changing ... but it certainly won't be that for everyone. Although it took me a few days to get completely comfortable with it, I am now hooked.

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