Last week was National Read an Ebook Week.
My reaction to hearing this was probably the same as yours - What? For Real? - so I didn't have high expectations, to say the least, when I agreed to make Painless available for a week long promotion in which the ebook version would be downloadable at a reduced or no cost.
But then the first Purchase Notification arrived in my email
And then another.
And another.
And they kept coming until it ended this past weekend.
Not only did Painless reach a whole new audience, but made this skeptic become a believer.
When Painless was first published last fall I took a wait/see attitude with ebooks. I envisioned them playing a big role in the future (although I don't think they will ever replace the printed book), but wasn't sure the future had arrived yet. And since my family was the first on our block with a Betamax, I had learned at a young age the value of taking a patient approach in regards to trendy new technologies.
Then around Xmas time the Kindle and Nook hype began. I remained skeptical - and to prove the point, I walked a packed NYC-bound train during rush hour, searching for any sign of any E-reader device, finding none. But then this December 28th headline made me do a double-take:
Huh?
One month later, Painless was published as an ebook by Smashwords. The results during the first month certainly didn't match the tantalizing headline - almost all of them were through a great program called Operation EBook Drop, which provides ebooks to soldiers overseas - so not until last week did I realize that the future is now.
