Free on-line reading: The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett

The Color of Magic (Discworld 1)

You can now read Terry Pratchett's The Color of Magic on-line using HarperCollins Publishers' Browse Inside site.

Book Description

Terry Pratchett's profoundly irreverent novels are consistent number one bestsellers in England, where they have garnered him a revered position in the halls of parody next to Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, Douglas Adams, and Carl Hiaasen.

The Color of Magic is Terry Pratchett's maiden voyage through the now-legendary land of Discworld. This is where it all begins--with the tourist Twoflower and his wizard guide, Rincewind.

Kindle International Edition

It had been rumored for a while and today came the official announcement: Ladies and gents! Amazon Kindle 2 is now internationally available in 100+ countries (but bizarrely not in Canada - anybody knows why?).

As of today, you can pre-order it from the co.uk site for $279 and Amazon will begin shipping them on 19th October. Even though the device is current sold from the .com site, a UK store is forthcoming. Currently the list of UK publishers whose books are available to Kindle 2 users include Atlantic Books, Bloomsbury, Canongate, Faber & Faber, Hachette, Harlequin, HarperCollins, Lonely Planet, Penguin, Profile Books, Quercus, Simon & Schuster and Wiley. It looks like the talks between Amazon and Random House are ongoing so Random House is not currently on the list. The number of available titles is supposed to be more than 250.000.

According to The Register, the Kindle international edition seems to be using GSM technology only. If this is true, the Kindle International may not be working everywhere in the world. Furthermore, the UK coverage map resembles 3's network, even though the operator denied having an agreement with Amazon.

What's this fee of $1.99 per book about?

Since the announcement, there has been a big debate about the international prices, especially about the $1.99 that the international users are supposed to pay per book downloaded. It turns out that this fee is payed only by the US Kindle users buying books outside the USA. International users won't pay that fee even if they use their Kindles outside their registered countries. I'm sure, that's precisely the reason why the international titles' prices will range between $11.99 and $13.99 rather than %9.99 like in the US. It looks like the extra fee is bundled with the book price for the non-US customers already.

As you can guess, it was all about releasing the Kindle 2 well before the holiday season. Q4 has always been the busiest quarter for Amazon so they wanted release the device early in October. Is that a half-baked solution? Will there be a lot of confusion about where to buy it and for how much? We'll see it pretty soon. In the meantime, competition is good for us, the consumers. I believe Sony's e-readers are better devices but we'll see if Amazon can break Sony's market dominance outside the US.

Free e-Book: The Demon Awakens by R.A. Salvatore

Suvudu are giving away 2 more e-books in various formats:

The Demon Awakens
by R. A. Salvatore

The Demon Awakens is the first book in the first DemonWars Saga trilogy by R.A. Salvatore. The book is also the first out of seven books in the combined DemonWars Saga.

Blurb

In The Demon Awakens, bestselling author R. A. Salvatore creates an astonishing new world for readers to explore—and an intrepid hero to lead the way: Elbryan Wynden, who must confront the dark tides of destiny in his epic search for justice and peace...

A great evil has awakened in the land of Corona, a terrible demon determined to spread death and misery. His goblin armies and fearsome giants ravage the settlements of the frontier, and in the small village of Dundallis their merciless attack leaves behind two shattered orphans: Pony and her lifelong friend, the youth Elbryan. Taken in by elves, Elbryan is raised to become a formidable ranger—a fateful role that will lead him into harrowing confrontation.

Meanwhile, on a far-off island, a shower of gemstones will fall onto the black sand shores. These heaven-sent stones carry within them an incredible power—the key to all that is good in the world and all that is evil, and it is up to one young monk to liberate them from the corrupt monastery that harvests them. Pray that they don't fall into the wrong, clawed hands...

Starfist: First to Fight
by David Sherman and Dan Cragg

"Marines, we have just become a low-tech deep recon patrol..."

Stranded in a hellish alien desert, stripped of their strategic systems, quick reaction force, and supporting arms, and carrying only a day's water ration, Marine Staff Sergeant Charlie Bass and his seven-man team faced a grim future seventy-five light-years from home. The only thing between his Marines and safety was eighty-five miles of uncharted, waterless terrain and two thousand bloodthirsty savages with state-of-the-art weapons in their hands and murder on their minds.

But the enemy didn't reckon on the warrior cunning of Marines' Marine Charlie Bass and the courage of the few good men who would follow him anywhere—even to death...

E-Book Universe

I came across a diagram prepared by technology news site techflash: The diagram, entitled E-Book Universe, shows the companies involved in e-book business, various readers, online libraries and various technologies. The relationships between the entities on the diagram are of type:

• Reading Device
• Wireless Provider
• Mobile App
• Content Provider
• Acquisition

I think it's great to try to capture the significant part of the booming e-book industry in one diagram.

Do You Wanna Date My Avatar?

Brilliant!!! :)

Lost in the vastness of the Malazan world?

Fantasy Book Review just published an interview done with Steven Erikson, the author of the Malazan Book of the Fallen series and the co-creator of the Malazan world.

If you're like me and time to time felt overwhelmed by the vastness of the background information in the Malazan books then you should read this excerpt taken from the interview:

One of the things both Cam and I were agreed on regarding this series, was to write in a style that conveyed a sense of vastness, with a strong flavour of realism where not all answers are forthcoming, not all truths survive their utterance, and sometimes mystery abides no matter how desperate we all are for an end to the questions. That said, there will be plenty of resolutions, but the world will not be wrapped up with a pretty bow.

As for the events that have been recounted in the books, well, things are always open to interpretation, and I am also rather pleased to learn from readers that the books fair well in re-reads. I am a writer obsessed with layering my narrative, so there’s plenty to find for the reader even after the raw events of the story are well-known.

For the complete interview please see "Steven Erikson interview (September 2009)".

E-book Search and Price Comparison Engines

If you are an e-book reader, you may find the following two sites very handy:

Inkmesh
Inkmesh is an e-book search engine. Its search index includes sites such as Sony eBook Store, Amazon.com, BooksOnBoard and Fictionwise. The complete list is supposed to grow to include other sites such as Waterstones.co.uk or ebooks.whsmith.co.uk.

I find the overall usability of the site pretty good. They've done a good job. I like the search result presentation. Some quick enhancements that come to my mind are:

• Sorting or searching according to device type or alternatively according to e-book format.
• Inclusion of non-english sites
• Ability to configure the number of books a search page contains

eBookPrice.info
eBookPrice.info is a price comparison site for e-books. I love the idea, even though I didn't quite like the site design (which is definitely secondary in my mind). One can use eBookPrice.info as a search engine or a comparison engine.