Suspend Your Disbelief

Posts Tagged ‘iPad’

Shop Talk |

Morris Lessmore

by Celeste Ng

We’ve talked a lot about how technology can bring books to life in new and exciting ways, but I hadn’t seen an example of an ebook that got me really excited until someone pointed me to this one. The brainchild of William Joyce, The Fantastic Flying Books of Morris Lessmore is a wonderful amalgalm of movie, book, and game. A story about a book-loving man who stumbles into a world inhabited by books, it’s at once a dramatization of the power of words and a meta-commentary on literature. Joyce was previously a designer for Pixar, and it shows in the […]


Shop Talk |

Best American Short Fiction from Storyville

by Lee Thomas

Many of you blog readers may recall Michael’s great post about the launch of Storyville – the mobile short story magazine that sends a short story to your iPhone or iPad every week for $4.99 / 6 month subscription. Quite a steal. Starting today, and for the next two Tuesdays, Storyville will feature one story from each of the three collections that are Finalists for The Story Prize, the largest cash prize – $20,000 – for best story collection published the previous year. The stories will be drawn from the three finalist collections: Memory Wall by Anthony Doerr (Scribners), Death […]


Shop Talk |

The Story Behind Storyville

by Michael Rudin

Don’t call Paul Vidich the Mayor of Storyville. He prefers Matchmaker. That’s because Storyville is less about Vidich, its creator, than his application’s ambitious plan to “bring together writers and readers.” As you might imagine, Storyville is focused solely on the short story. Exclusive to owners of iPhones and iPads, the application promises to deliver one story every week, for which subscribers must pay $4.99 for a six-month subscription. In the end, this means Storyville’s residents will end up paying less than a quarter per story. Vidich promises they won’t be just any stories. The Storyville editorial team is focused […]


Shop Talk |

Under the Covers

by Lee Thomas

For all of you readers who love new technology, but remain bookish at heart, how about an iPad/Kindle/Nook cover that marries the two? We’ve rounded up a few of our favorite trompe l’oeil covers, so you can have your cake … but dress it up like a book. Or give a bibliophile friend a lovely gift. 1. Leather bound by Pad and Quill 2. Hans Christian Andersen by Vintage Covers 3. Hardback Cloth BOOK by Nedrelow 4. By the Numbers Moleskine-style by RightBrainy 5. Classic black Dodocase 6. Horses (I can’t help but think about Patti Smith with this one) […]


Shop Talk |

If you were reading this on paper, you'd be finished by now.

by Celeste Ng

Perhaps our recent posts on e-books have you jonesing for an iPad or a Kindle. Or maybe they’ve made you nostalgic for a good old print hardback. Either way, here’s something else to consider: reading on paper is faster than reading on a screen. The Nielsen Norman group (no, that Nielsen) found that reading in electronic format was up to 10.7% slower than reading a paper book. Reports Macworld: Nielsen’s findings were based on the performance of 24 users who “like reading and frequently read books.” The subjects each read different short stories by Ernest Hemingway on all four platforms, […]


Essays |

The Age of Binary Bookmaking

by Michael Rudin

Today’s technological delights are well on their way to becoming tomorrow’s demands, entrenching themselves in ways that will do more than force bookbinding as a business model to adapt, but allow writing, as an art form, to expand and thrive. These are good things. Welcome to the age of Binary Bookmaking.



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