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Archive for the ‘Literature’ Category

Got my Nook 3 weeks ago, I wanted to use it for a bit before making a review, so far I must say that I love my Nook, aside from a couple of things I will detail in just seconds, everything just works as expected, this thing feels nice on your hand, not too heavy not too light, it feels just like holding a book.

There are thousands of free eBooks on the internet, including the latest bestsellers! so it is nice to be able to obtain all those books I have been thinking about buying for a while and just having them ready at no cost for reading at my own pace, there are literally hundreds of sites where you can find free eBooks.

One thing I have noticed is that the Nook (and I think eReaders in general) manage to bring us back to the habit of reading books, with the advancement of the internet and so many connected devices these days, it is easy to spend hours looking at a computer, laptop, notebook iphone etc screen entertaining ourselves with new information, eReaders make it easy for us to satisfy our hunger for new information without the eyestrain that comes along with those other methods, the Nook is a great device, in my opinion the best eReader out there,

Just to make it better Barnes & Noble pushed Software 1.3 to the device a few weeks ago, this upgrade fixed a few things that were not working very nicely, besides stability improvements the update added a few new features such as in-store-reading, games and a web browser.

Some people have complained about long boot up times, that’s true ONLY if you totally turn off your nook, by default it has a sleep mode where it can go to sleep or wakeup in just half a second.

The only things I would like to see improved is the fact that you cannot yet go directly to a specific page on your documents, (Though you can bookmark any page for quick access) but I’m sure that will soon be added, it’s not that hard to implement, I would also like to see ways to zoom in or out in .pdf documents.

Oh don’t forget to download and install the Calibre eBook Manager  to sync and manage content on your Nook!"

Yes; so late, I finished reading this treasure, “Cien años de soledad” as it is known in its original language, and I must say that it is for sure one of the best novels ever written, and must definitely the best work in modern Spanish literature; and I don’t say: “so late” because it was at a late hour of the day that I finished reading it, but because it was so late in life I decided to read it, I should have done it years ago; this book can certainly change one’s way to look at many things once you’ve read it.

 Gabriel Garcia Marquez work is studied in universities across the world and is no surprise to me as its "magical realism" (as his style is commonly known) involves you from the start to the very end of this book, it is highly original, imaginative, and unprecedented. One of the most charming qualities of this book is that you can pick it up and allow it to fall open at any random page, read that one page only, and still enjoy it for the imagery, the sheer beauty with which everything is described and narrated.

The novel acquires so much momentum and strength at the very end with its monumental and surprising ending! Gabriel Garcia Marques certainly took his time writing the last pages of his work to create a masterpiece finish really fitting his great novel; there’s so much I could say; I could write pages about the quality and literary value of this work but you must see for yourself, If you like reading do not, I repeat DO NOT die without reading it. (that’s the advice a friend gave me about the book and I really must thank him because he could not be more right)

Just finished reading the Spanish translation of “Vol De Nuit” (Vuelo Nocturno) by  Antoine de Saint-Exupry as it was suggested to me by an old friend;  Everything the author relates in the book he does with full knowledge of what he writes, Exupry himself was a pilot during most of his adult life, in fact he died while in a reconnaissance mission during World War II.

After having read another work from the same author (Le Petit Prince) which is actually a widely acclaimed masterpiece and not precisely liking the aeronautics topic myself, I have to say that it was indeed a little hard for me to finish reading the book, however the work in my opinion has a great literary value because of its very well organized narrative, amazingly deep created metaphors and a great documental weight. rarely in literature you can find literary quality and documental value along side each other, so this gives “Vuelo Nocturno” a special lift among other books I have read, I believe the book is probably one of the best works in modern french literature, I recommend anyone to read it.