Ebooks are the wave of the
future. Even those publishers who don't want to believe it's true know it. I do
most of my reading on my Kindle or tablet now. When people are reading ebooks
they are reacting to them as people have always done to books. They react to
the text. The text is the book, not the container the text is in.
And yet there is still
something magical about having a print release...
Everyone old enough to be
reading my books now grew up with books as things made of paper and card. Some
with pictures in them as well as the text. Sometimes stunning colour plates.
Books weighed down your schoolbag. Their pages got wrinkly from reading in the
bath. Old books got worn out, pages yellow and foxed, starting to fall apart.
But we held them in as much affection and considered them as precious as family
photographs. A book signed by the author is especially exciting for some people
and you can't really do that with an ebook.
Paper books have such
strong emotional resonance for some people that it's hard to let them go
entirely in favour of ebooks. It's like the switch from vinyl to CD. Some
people resisted that for a long time. And though the ebook is on the rise, but
it will be a long time before it replaces the kind of book that counts as a
work of art in itself. Or cookbooks, with their glossy photos of fantasy food. Or
children's books that babies appreciate for their chewiness as well as their
content.
So as great as ebooks are,
and as much as I'm delighted to be published by a "digital first"
publisher, I can't deny that parcel of author copies gives me a thrill like no
other.
I have three books in
print now. For your chance to win a copy of the latest, Higher Ground, comment
below by Sunday 14th April at 09:00 UK time. Make sure you leave an email
address so I can contact you if you win.
Higher Ground Blurb
Zach is impatient and likes to hurry. Adam likes to take it
slow and to tease. But, they’d have worked it all out – if only the end of the
world hadn’t gotten in the way.
Zach Benesh is sure his
prediction is right – the island colony of Zahara is about to sink into the
ocean. Adam Gray isn’t as certain, but he’s happy to follow the intense,
brilliant geophysicist into the mountains to escape the flooding. Though he’d
be even happier without three hundred other people – and their pets – tagging
along. He’d like to have Zach all to himself out there.
But Zach’s prediction is
right and as disaster begins to unfold towards an unstoppable, inevitable
conclusion, the two young scientists must become a team in the fight to save
their people. They draw strength from their rapidly developing relationship,
but the higher Zach and Adam climb, the more difficult the tests they face – as
lovers and as men.
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