Unfortunately, Rapid City Public Library doesn't have audiobooks available through NetLibrary. Instead, they use Overdrive for downloadable audiobooks. I looked through the selection of books in MP3 format, since I use an iPod, but I wasn't that impressed with the selection. Only two things stood out: Ender's Shadow and Tess of the D'Urbervilles.
My mother raved to me months ago about the Ender series, and I know she listened to them on CD in the car with my little sister. But Ender's Shadow is only a parallel peice that goes along with Ender's Game. Tess was abridged, and I don't see any point in reading or listening to an abridged version of a book.
But Tess is a title I've been wanting to read for some time. Seeing as I just checked out an audiobook to transfer to my iPod so that I can listen to it while on breaks at work, and I am still chugging delightfully through James Harriet's All Things Bright and Beautiful in the car, I decided that another audiobook wouldn't be the way to go.
Thankfully, Google was there to save me.
Google Books is a wonderful thing, whether you're looking for recreational reading or doing research. For the latter, even a limited preview of the work (which displays like a .pdf in a webpage frame) can be useful, since the copyright information needed for citation is always shown. But Tess is there and now also in my virtual library.
Recently I've been investigating the Acer Aspire, since I have seen so many patrons using it. One reviewer says they use it as a Kindle, since it is cheaper and of a comparable size. It makes sense, but even with books available in so many alternative formats, I doubt their print versions are ever going to disappear.
There's something about owning a physical, tangible book that means something more than just a shelf decoration. My husband first asked me out by giving me a copy of The Annotated Alice, which I swooned over as much as I did him. For my eighteenth birthday, my parents each gave me a copy of the very first book I ever read all on my own: The Elephant and the Bad Baby. Just as I collected Disney DVDs to add to my library with the rationale that "one day, I'll be able to share these classics with children," so to do I want to be able to share classic children's literature with them. My mother and I bicker fromt time to time about which of us will recieve the gems of my ailing grandmother's library one day.
Books - physical books - are powerful things and will not be replaced easily. Sure, it may be more convienant to enjoy a book in an alternate form, but that doesn't mean the printed word on the physical page is ever going to disappear.
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