Ezy Win

The book Confessions of a Shopaholic, by Sophie Kinsella, is wonderful for people who want to read a fun light-hearted romantic comedy. In the novel, the protagonist, Rebecca “Becky” Bloomwood, loves to buy any kind of retail merchandise. She buys all products like Christian Dior replica handbags, Hermes replica handbags, Juicy Couture replica handbags, scarves, designer clothes, and designer shoes. The tiny concern is, she works as a financial journalist for a relatively small magazine called Successful Saving, which does not pay nearly enough to cover all of her expenses.
Kinsella starts the novel by introducing the main character, Rebecca Bloomwood, who works for the financial magazine Successful Saving in London, England. She explains that she really doesn’t like job, but she is in love with shopping. She shops all the time, without consideration of how she will pay for all of her purchases. Becky continues to get numerous mailings from her bank, telling her she is overdrawn and all of the credit card companies telling her she needs to make payments on her balances. Becky forces herself to come up with funny excuses as to why she can’t pay her bills. She tells her account manager at her bank, Derek Smeath that she can’t pay the bank because she has a rare disease and she also tells him that she can’t come to a meeting because her leg is broken. The excuses Becky uses to avoid Mr. Smeath become more humorous as the novel progresses.
In the middle of all of her debt problems , Becky catches the eye of a man named Luke Brandon, who owns a PR Company, Brandon Communications which represents financial companies.
Soon, Becky uncovers a scam when two of the big financial companies get their clients to switch their pension funds into new accounts before one of the companies is bought out and pays their clients a big windfall. The problem is, one of the companies involved with the scam is a company that Luke represents at Brandon Communications. But, Becky releases the story to the press anyway and quickly she gains praise from almost everyone in London, while also catching the eye of a television producer, who wants to have Becky on their show to give financial advice, which is funny because Becky is still in debt. She also gains the respect of Luke, who sees how talented she is and who becomes grateful to her for showing him how bad his clients were to their clients.
Of course, in the end, Luke and Becky fall in love and Becky is offered a job at the show Morning Coffee, where she answers questions about financial advice to people who call in and tell her their financial woes.
This book is two things, funny and witty. Becky Bloomwood learns important lessons about self-confidence and the importance of taking responsibility for her actions. The book’s heroine is loveable and the reader finds him/her self hoping Becky will be able to pay off her debt. So, if you are a reader who wants to read for a fun, coming of age story, then Confessions of a Shopaholic is a must read.

If you’ve just handed over $359 for a Kindle 2 or $489 for a Kindle DX (if you were lucky enough to find it in stock that is), then you may find yourself a little short of disposable cash. However, no need to worry too much – even if Amazon’s Kindle ebook reader series – or family as they prefer to refer to it – does have a pretty high ticket price, it can actually allow you to save money.

Bearing in mind that there are no printing costs associated with electronic books and distribution, although not completely free, is still cheaper than that which would be associated with a printed book, you will probably find that you can save a fair bit of money on the latest bestsellers at Amazon’s Kindle store. Of course, in the period between paying for your Kindle and the next pay check you may want to do more than economise a little – so why not take advantage of the free Kindle books which are on offer direct from the Amazon website?

All you need to do is visit Amazon’s site and open up the Kindle store. Once you’re there, perform a search for any type of book and choose the option “sort by – price low to high” – you’ll find the box to make this selection at the top right hand corner of the screen. You’ll then find that you’re presented with a list of classic titles – The Origin of Species, Sherlock Holmes, Treasure Island etc. There were over 150 free books the last time I looked, chiefly classics but there were a fair number of more modern books available also.

Once you’ve exhausted the free books on offer you will then be presented with a a good selection of available titles with prices between $0.01 to $1. These are fairly nominal fees, and considerably less than you might expect to pay for the equivalent physical product. You could pretty quickly recoup a fair portion of the price of your shiny new Kindle and, considering the price, you might find yourself trying some authors which you wouldn’t normally choose.

The titles in the Kindle bookstore are added to on a regular basis, so it’s well worth your time to check back every now and again to keep up to date with what bargains are on offer.

The Amazon Kindle ebook reader series has garnered a enormous amount of publicity over the past few months. The Kindle 2 was launched in February 2009, to replace the original Kindle. Soon after, in June 2009, the new larger Kindle DX was launched – specifically aimed at readers of newspapers, magazines and textbooks.

Sales of the Kindle readers, books from the Kindle bookstore and Kindle accessories are said to be extremely good. Although many industry analysts have suggested that the Kindle price is too high consumers seem more than willing to pay for Amazon’s high tech toy. It’s noteworthy that, where a Kindle version of a book coexists alongside the conventional paperback or hardback offering, the sales of the Kindle version account for 35% of sales.

That’s a very high percentage given that the Kindle has been available for just eighteen months. As impressive as the sales figures have been, there are still many more sales opportunities for the traditional formats. Probably it shouldn’t be too surprising – someone willing to pay between $359 and $489 for an electronic book reader is probably going to be an avid reader after all.

It really is easy to believe the predictions that the Kindle is going to alter the way we read books, and probably in the relatively near future. However, it’s also worth thinking about the other side of the coin – the Kindle is going to change the way books are published and presented to the public.

We can probably expect the traditional publishing pattern – hardback release followed by paperback release a few months later – to change. After all, why not release the electronic version first and hold back on expensive print runs until the likely level of interest has been established? And considering the reduced financial exposure of publishing houses, and the somewhat reduced time required to get a new book onto Amazon’s virtual shelves, might we see an increased willingness to profile new, untried authors?

We might even see a significant increase in authors who choose to self publish rather than follow the more traditional route.

In years to come, the Kindle will be replaced by ebook readers considerably more sophisticated. These will address the frequently cited shortcomings of the current Kindle readers – lack of color, high device cost, less than satisfactory contrast etc. The Kindle will doubtless seem primitive in comparison – but it is the Kindle that is revolutionising the way we read and, just as importantly, the method by which books are published.