@ Tony
“For literary fiction — genre fiction too, for that matter — the notion of in-book interactivity is enough to freeze the blood. The writer spends time and effort creating a set of characters and a sequence of events, and shapes his story with an eye toward the greatest impact he can get from his material. In-book interactivity?”

As a counter to that, sometimes i really feel that the writer could do with some enhanced features on books; a recent example would be the last Harry Potter book. the climax was confusing at its best. I’d rather have Warner Brothers film the ending than the confused cacophony which came out. And, i’d rather read Jo for the story bit rather than see arbit cut-scenes on screen. LOTR is another example. Battle sequences are the most natural fit for an interactive book – most movies are oriented towards it anyway.

And on the topic of why E appeals to the SF fan; i feel its mostly due to the nature of the genre itself – SF attracts early adopters. These are the guys who were dreaming of reading books on screens/tablets/random-SF-screens other than paper before e-ink was a twinkle in PVI’s eye. It appeals to, atleast, my sense of participation in the genre

In terms of interactive books, I appreciate the comments from Tony and Ficbot. As an author, I don’t want to write a million endings depending on what people vote for. Sometimes the power of the story is that things don’t work out the way the reader wanted them to. (How about we change 1984 so Big Brother reforms?) Certainly as a reader, it is nice to be able to use dictionary features and, especially in non-fiction, wonderful to be able to hyperlink to references to see if the references really do say what the author is saying they do.

Not that there’s anything wrong with ‘choose-your-own-adventure’ stories. In the eWorld, we call those text-based adventure games, right. Now that’s a genre that vanished. I wonder if its elimination has anything to do with the decline in reading?

Rob Preece
Publisher, http://www.BooksForABuck.com

I hope you’re right — if I want stories and non-fiction titles done by committee, I can dive back into series television or the average textbook. I’d hate to think that effort that should go into expanding the supply of available titles could be spent on introducing distractions or active detriments to the books themselves. As to dictionary lookup, it’s already there — reading on the PC or Palm in EReader or MobiPocket, I can highlight a word and look it up if I’ve installed a dictionary. Seems to me that wikipedia or video clips would require an always-on connection to the web from within your reader software, and at that point we’d be letting in distractions again.

And it may be open to question just how much readers really want this sort of thing anyway. Techies may like the idea just because it’s so freaking cool to be able to do that (and, yeah, it is). But look at the humble footnote. This is just my impression, but it seems to me that more often these days, the footnotes are found not at the bottoms of the pages, but in their own section at the end of the book. Some of that may simply be due to ease of manuscript preparation and printing, but I’d guess that part of it is the desire to avoid pulling the reader out of the flow. Not knowing what a word means and not being able to get the meaning from context breaks the flow, so the dictionary lookup feature seems desirable. But the rest puts that seductive and distracting ‘and here’s another interesting link or video clip you might want to check out while you’re here’ into play, and that seems more likely to break the flow than give much real benefit to the reader. Just my impression and not the result of any careful study, though.

Bests,

–tr

Interactive fiction of the type you suggest HAS been done before, though—the Choose Your Own Adventure series for kids which was popular when I was young comes to mind. It has been done. But I think everyone would agree that those books, while fun for kids, do lack the richness of a full-fledged story put out the usual way.

And I’m not sure most writers of non-fiction, who try to structure the presentation of their material and the flow of their argument for greatest effect, would be that crazy about in-book interactivity. They spent their time, they crafted their arguments, and presented their book — their sculpture of words — just as a novelist would.

Interaction and discussion can take place OUTSIDE the book. That’s why God made the blog and the internet forum. If a writer wants to change his text because of something that came out of such a discussion, he can do a new edition later. For myself as a reader, when I sit down to read a book in print or in e, I want it to be just me and the writer, and that’s true for fiction or non-fiction. And I doubt I’m alone in that. In-book interactivity would be just one more interruption, one more distraction from the book’s content, in a world full of distractions.

But increasing the number of titles available? Yes, absolutely, and the sooner the better. Fiction and non-fiction. Mainstream and genre fiction alike. All of it. Every title should be available in both print and e, and sooner or later, that’s going to be SOP in book publishing. If I have one complaint about Fictionwise, eReader, BooksonBoard and the others, it’s that there aren’t enough titles there — and that’s not their doing, since they can’t sell ebooks that the publishers don’t offer in any format other than print.

There’s a ton of backlist I’d purchase in e, to say nothing of new releases. I don’t believe I’m unique, and I wish that the publishers would simply get on with it. More titles, and faster, please.

Bests,

–tr

I do not find page turning in ereaders to be a hindrance, nor hunting for a page previously read to be any more difficult than in print books. Now, if I could e-search a book, that would be a off the charts fantastic. If I could make notes while reading, I’d be so giddy I’d probably faint.

The best thing about ebooks is having access to and being exposed to books you never had access to before. If your local store does not carry the book how do you know it exists? If you can not browse the book on store web pages, how do you know if you want to buy it?

“I am thinking why and cannot yet figure the reason, I guess it’s something to do with the writer’s style and with the print book formatting as well as with how much I need to go back and forth in the book.”

My thinking? Some writers may require more “going back and forth” than others. That’s a function of the clarity and memorability of the writing. Also, for some readers, long sentences won’t work out on a PDA and print might be better. How about a Sony, Kindle or the OLPC XO, though? Or are even they not up to Faulkner? Also, I suspect that for the easiest and most enjoyable reading on a PDA, heavy use of short, snappy dialogue–with some description but not overdone–would be good for many people. But let’s not confuse easy reading with literary merit. In the end, are some books simply destined for P if most people want to appreciate them to the max? Or will improved technology take care of it? The ultimate triumph, of course, as some see it, will be e-books with flippable pages and the resolution and feel of p-books.

Thanks,
David

It’s true that there are some books that I like to read as print more than as e, but the reverse is true also as the huge Against the Day stands in my library unread while if I could get an e-version I would start reading it immediately.

I am thinking why and cannot yet figure the reason, I guess it’s something to do with the writer’s style and with the print book formatting as well as with how much I need to go back and forth in the book.