The Kindle has no soul but many modern conveniences

Last weekend, I finished my book on the plane, and J.R. kindly loaned me his Kindle so I could start reading Juliet, Naked. I was a bit hesitant, since it goes against all that I hold dear, or you know, just my deep and abiding love of books. But, I was trapped on a plane with no other books in sight, so I did it. I read the damn book on the Kindle.

I didn't totally hate it, to be truthful. It made reading at lunchtime way easier (I didn't have to hold the book open, I turned the page with the push of a button). Plus, it did give me a little geek cred. However, there were a few ways it didn't live up to the old paper version of reading: I was betraying my publishing background. It didn't smell like a book. There are no pages. I never wanted to linger over the text. Real books don't randomly crash (though the Kindle did recover pretty quickly). And in the end, I know I'll stick with regular books, if only because the thought of reading poetry on an e-reader makes my flesh crawl.