A post by Rachelle Gardner came through my blog box this morning. It was so cute I couldn’t resist talking about it some more. Rachelle asked “Do we miss the days when a book was just a book?” The responses came fast and furious this morning. The comments could be divided among the ‘real’ book camp , the ‘convenience’ contingent, and the ‘I love both worlds,’ group.
This had me thinking ten years into the future-hopefully when I become a grandma, or ‘Nana’ as my kids call their grandmothers-will my grandkids read/hear mainly e-books? Will they want to sit with me on the couch or their bed while I read them a story from an old print book? Will they ooh and ahh over colorful but one dimensional illustrations? Will their chubby toddler fingers have the dexterity to turn a page instead of swipe?
My teens/young adult kids speculate e-books will reign. All of them spend 95% of their reading time on iPhones, computers, and Kindles. This is where they get their world news, local news, community and social news (Twitter & FB). All of their friends in the 16-25 age range have similar reading habits.The only paper magazines they read are skateboard and music mag’s and that’s because they aren’t in an e-version yet. My college kid can’t wait for e-textbooks and neither can I since this translates to a more affordable cost for a book he won’t keep.
Although my kids read a lot of paper books growing up, they don’t seem to have an issue with joining the e-book world. So I have to speculate that they will read to their children from e-readers. In the next ten years the e-book will probably evolve to 3-D holographic illustrations, making it exciting, but eventually dulling the imagination.
They will tell their kids, my grandkids, how they had to dust the bookshelves for Nana and how she used to collect book markers. They will have to explain those too. But for now, I just hope my grandkids will love the written word and enjoy storytelling.
I still have my Companion Library of Classics that my mom bought in 1967, 44 years ago. They are in fairly good shape and I suppose they can last another ten years. Now, I must sign off, I have to go box them and a few other favorites up and save them for my future grandkids.
Now which favorites make it into the box? Which books would you choose to save for your grandkids or great grandkids?
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