Paper books are more enticing
Why is out of sight so often out of mind for me with ebooks?
When I first came across the concept of e-readers I thought it was a gimmick. Why on earth would anyone prefer a small plastic rectangle to a well-thumbed paperback novel, or a fresh-smelling non-fiction hardback? And then at some point at least twelve years ago (I know this because we lived in our previous flat) a friend’s girlfriend showed me her new Kindle and I thought maybe it’s not as useless as I thought. Then someone likened the e-reader to a convenient, portable Walkman, with paperbacks your treasured LPs, and I was sold. I got my Kobo Mini for Christmas 2012.
Because I was still mainly reading physical (paper) books I quickly learnt that I would forget what was on there completely if I didn’t write a list somewhere. Consequently everything I added to the Kobo from Project Gutenberg or similar (all those Anthony Trollope novels!) had to be written on my To Read list, with a note that said it was lurking in digital form already.
Ordinarily, books that I’ve bought or borrowed but haven’t yet read sit on a small set of shelves that housed textbooks when I was a mature student nearly twenty years ago. I walk past them several times a day, they catch my eye, I muse on what I might fancy reading next. Half the time I will of course read something entirely different, from the library or a charity shop, or back in the days I saw them more often, borrowed from the Library of Mum and Dad (like the Bank of Mum and Dad but more interesting. And in my parents’ case, far more well-stocked).
As you can see from the photo, once you’re reading a book on the Kobo it displays the cover - not always reliably the actual book that’s partway read, for some reason, but still there is a cover to look at. Leave it lying around on the coffee table like a paperback and it whispers Read Me as you go about your day. It’s obvious that you have an unfinished book waiting, and - most of the time - what that book is.
The Kobo Mini was taken out of support in May this year. Mine still works perfectly well, but I can’t do any more upgrades and I can’t buy any more books. I can still add books from the likes of Project Gutenberg but these days I tend to buy them direct from Kobo more often than not. I mean what’s the point of being middle-aged and paying off your mortgage if you can’t spend the extra disposable income on books? Now that I’ve got a smartphone I don’t even need to replace the Kobo Mini, I can use an app on my phone. And therein lies the problem.
Our local library moved from an e-reader-compatible e-book borrowing system a few years ago to BorrowBox which was first an app on our household tablet and now on my phone. I often borrow an e-book or audiobook, forget it’s there, and then I get the email telling me the loan is about to expire. Or I go into the app to browse the catalogue and find I have a half-read or half-listened-to book there already. With the Kobo app I don’t even go in there to browse, I only open it when I want to read a book. Which involves remembering that it’s there in the first place.
Almost exactly two years ago we put our flat up for sale. We still haven’t moved (long story) but needless to say it’s spurred us on to a certain amount of decluttering, including piles and piles of books. There is an agreement in our house - let’s not call it a rule, let’s say ‘strong encouragement’ - that until we move I won’t buy more books that are actual blocks of paper that would take up space in a packing box. So if I want a book that isn’t in the library or is one I’d like to keep, it has to be digital at the moment.
I bought half a dozen e-books with my birthday money. I have started two of them so far, realising with a start a few days later when I was wondering what to read next, that I’d left them untouched after an initial burst of activity. The first was a memoir and I thought perhaps I just wasn’t in the mood for someone else’s bleak but well-written life, but the second was a novel I was enjoying and had been looking forward to (The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho by Paterson Joseph, since you ask).
The problem is that although my phone is lying around for me to notice as I go about my day, there is nothing about it that says ‘book’. I see it and think of emails I ought to reply to, the To Do list that’s getting out of hand, a photo I meant to send to my dad. Even when I switch the screen on, neither the BorrowBox nor Kobo apps tell me I’m halfway through a book. They don’t display the enticing cover of the novel I’m on chapter 3 of or the audiobook I’m two hours into. Short of mocking up a paperback cover and wrapping my phone in it I’m not sure what to do. Maybe this is a sign that I need to read a book all the way to the end without distractions like sleep, washing up, or work. Could someone explain that to my boss for me?
If anyone has any tips, or would like to tell me about a setting on the Kobo app that I’ve overlooked, which would indeed tell me I was halfway through a book, feel free to reply to the email or comment on the post.