I promised a final report after the eBookWise 1500 Librarian was released. It was released last week. It took me a little while to get the computer and the device to talk to each other, but the problem turned out to be that I had only turned the computer off and on after each program was installed. I was supposed to have completely unplugged the computer.

 

Please do not flame me over this. You are authorized to disagree with me. I know that some people would rather spend 42 days stuck in a semiprivate hospital room with a roommate who is in love with the soaps, than possess a device that will allow them to read and mentally tune out the television.

 

Forget about all the negative comments in my initial report. As long as I have loved and been faithful to my Rocket, I have to admit that the 1500 is better. It will allow me to do things that my Rocket won't allow, including making handwritten notes with my stylus, so henceforth the Rocket will be my pleasure reading device and the 1500 (we have named her Isis, to relate well to my computer, whose name is Sesheta. Sesheta was the ancient Egyptian goddess of libraries and librarians; Isis was the Lady high everything else.) will be my work device.

 

The only problem I'm still having is the fact that Isis holds only about 20 books. But after I get to the computer store and get a SmartMedia card and its driver, Isis will hold over 300 books very easily.

 

This is a winner.

 

If you have any interest in being able to carry 300, or even 20, books around in your purse or backpack without tearing your shoulder into shreds, hie yourself over to eBookWise.com and buy the eBookWise while the price is right. $110 will buy and deliver it, and you'll then be given $20 to spend on books. All books are 20% off for about another week.

 

With this device, you can read ANY BOOK ON THE INTERNET, unless it is in an encrypted format incompatible with .txt and .htm and .doc. You can definitely use it to read anything posted on PG and anything posted on Blackmask.

 

Between FictionWise and eBookWise, literally thousands of commercial titles are available. Also anything you can get in .rb will transform itself into the right format in less than a minute.

 

If you use a PDA or even a cellular phone with a lot of memory, you can carry around one to three books, if you don't mind reading in teensie weensie typesize with a line that consists of three words (or two if they're longer words). Blech. Yesterday at the family Christmas party I was showing this thing to my husband's former wife, and she held it in her hand and said, "Well, it doesn't weigh less than a book that size." I conceded the point--a Rocket is 18 ounces and I think an eBookWise 1500 is about 22 ounces-- but then pointed out that it weighs far less than 20, or 300, books that size. (When anybody in our family is in the hospital for more than a day, daily book runs are necessary to take away the read books and bring new ones. This device will obviate that necessity. Although it is true that you should never have valuable stuff lying around your hospital room, as thieves are familiar with hospital rooms, you can ask a kind nurse to lock it away for you when you're about to go to sleep.)

 

Or--You're travelling cross-country. Every evening you stop at a motel. At the motel, you have your choice of the Gideon Bible if it hasn't been swiped, the food service menu, or television--or your own selection of 300 books.

 

OR--if you're stuck in the hospital emergency room waiting interminably for somebody to come and attend to you or your loved one, wouldn't you like to have something to read with you? Maybe even two somethings, so that the person in bed, if it's not you, can also have something to read?

 

If I had the money I'd give one of these to everybody I know.

 

If you don't want one, don't buy it. But if you can afford it, at least give it a one-week trial. Then if you still don't like it, give it to somebody you don't like.

 

Anne