I've taken some books out from our e-library and I've also bought a few for my Kindle Fire. (Eek! I get my Kindle Fire HD 8.9 on Nov 21st, I can't wait! So excited!) I love to read. I read on the train home from work and I also love reading at night before I fall asleep, I've done that since I was a child. My favorite genres are mostly: History, Historical Fiction, Fiction or Biography.

Here's what I've been reading lately:

1. Rena's Promise: Two Sisters in Auschwitz



I LOVED LOVED LOVED this! I've always had an obsession with Holocaust history. Of course Anne Frank started my obsession, but I've wanted to dig deeper, and this book is beyond fascinating, real, in depth & raw. I've read this 3x's already. (Rena Kornreich Gelissen).

2. Sarah's Key



I liked this, but I didn't love it. It's a bittersweet story, told from two different time periods. But I wish it was more in depth and you got to know the characters better. This fictional book takes place during World War II. 

3. Surviving the Angel of Death: The True Story of a Mengele Twin in Auschwitz



Can you see a theme with the books I've been reading lately? I actually watched a documentary on Netflix, that the author of this book; Eva Mozes Kor did. (It's called Forgiving Dr. Mengele). It was really good. This book is written more for young adults so it doesn't delve as deep in depth as I wanted it too, but it's still a fascinating read.

4. The Archivist : A Novel



This book also takes place partly after World War II and then again in the present. It's told from the point of view of a man in his 60's who is an archivist at the university library he works at. He is in charge of rare unreleased T.S. Eliot letters (the poet), that a curious college student in her early 30's wants to see & she reminds, Matt of his wife that committed suicide years & years earlier. The letter's aren't to be released yet though. There's a lot of flash backs in this book. But it's written so well... and now I'm contemplating buying a copy of this for myself. (Took it out from the e-library). It's really intriguing.

5. Anne Frank's Family: The Extraordinary Story of Where She Came From, Based on More Than 6,000 Newly Discovered Letters, Documents, and Photos 


 
I can't remember if I shared this one in a prior post, but it's another book I purchased recently. If you are interested in Anne Frank's family history this is definitely a good read. It tells a lot of the background story of her relatives.

(I do use Amazon Associates, but not because I've made any money- because I haven't! lol! But I like that I can show a picture/link with a product when I'm blogging. Plus I do recommend Amazon.com for their low prices. That or Ebay!) 
 
 

So excited! I've been following the news very closely about the release of a newer bigger Kindle Fire from Amazon.com. I've owned the original Kindle Fire since it came out on it's release date in 2011. I love it, I use it every day, on the train commuting, at home in bed, etc. (Here's my blog entry on the original Kindle Fire).

This afternoon was Amazon.com's press release to talk about the new products. (I was following along on Twitter for all the updates!) They are releasing 3 different new Kindle Fires. Kindle Fire HD 7" & 8.9". Plus a Kindle Fire HD 4G. Kindle Fire HD 8.9" also comes in either 16GB or 32GB storage. (I ordered the 16GB). They are available for pre-order on Amazon.com and will be released November 20th, 2012. I will be selling my original Kindle Fire once my new one arrives. :-)

• 1920x1200 HD display with polarizing filter and anti-glare technology for rich color and deep contrast from any viewing angle
• Exclusive Dolby audio and dual stereo speakers for crisp, booming sound without distortion
• High performance 1.5Ghz dual-core processor with Imagination PowerVR 3D graphics core for fast and fluid performance
• Dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi for 40% faster downloads and streaming
• Over 22 million movies, TV shows, songs, magazines, books, audiobooks, and popular apps and games such as Facebook, Netflix, Twitter, HBO GO, Pandora, and Angry Birds
• Integrated support for Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo! and more, as well as Exchange calendar, contacts, and email
• Free Skype video calls with front-facing HD camera
• Free unlimited cloud storage for all your Amazon content 

I LOVE my Kindle Fire. I use it every day. I use it on the train to read or listen to music or browse the web. (I use my T-Mobile Sidekick 4G as a router). I use it on the train platform waiting for my train because there's free wi-fi at 30th Street Station. At work on breaks I might read a book or look at a magazine. At home sometimes instead of my laptop I'll browse the internet and read books before bed. Sometimes I watch Netflix on it too.

I've had my Kindle Fire since the day it was released. (About 5 months). When I would play a game and then exit the game, sometimes there would be this burned image of the game on my screen sort of invisible. I thought it was a just a glitch, so I'd restart my Kindle and it would be fine.

But then it started doing it with other things. Sometimes the search bar would burn into the screen & the navigation bar, so that when I rotated my Kindle I would have 2 dark stripes running alone the screen and if you looked closer you could see the ghosted icons. That wasn't going away even when I would restart. I would sometimes get the keyboard burned into the screen, or the icons on your home screen. It was getting really irritating. I tried to doing a factory reset which wipes out everything from your Kindle Fire, but that did not help. The ghosting was still happening.

I searched for the issue on the Amazon website, on their Kindle Fire Help Forum. There was topic about the ghosting and burned images. It seems a lot of people are having this issue. It's some sort of defect with some of the Kindle Fires.

I contacted Amazon by using their 'Contact Us' button. They must be there 24 hours because I called on a Saturday night at 9:30pm. The customer service rep asked if I had done a reset (holding the button down for 20 seconds). I told him I had done a factory reset and that hadn't resolved the ghosting on the screen.

He told me Amazon would send me a replacement. I just had to send the damaged one back in the box of the replacement with the prepaid UPS label they would email me. They ask for the last 4 digits of one of the credit cards on your Amazon.com account. If they don't receive the damaged device back within 30 days they will charge your account the full price for the Kindle Fire plus shipping.

My replacement Kindle Fire arrived in 2 days! (So I didn't have to go through Kindle withdraw too long, hehe!). Then I packed up my old Kindle and we dropped it off at a UPS store to be mailed. Amazon got my old device back within 2 days also.

Soooo... just beware my Kindle Fire fans. This is an issue with some of the devices. If your Kindle is under warranty Amazon will replace it. My 2nd Kindle Fire is working perfectly and I hope it does so after 5 months of use. Hopefully there will be no need for anymore replacements!



 

I've started purchasing books for my Kindle Fire, (there's a lot of free books in the Amazon Kindle store & I also check out e-books from my local library). I wanted to share what I've been reading lately. 

1. Girl in Translation



2. The Story Sisters



3. Heaven Is Here



4. Prairie Tale



5. Confessions of a Prairie Bitch



6. Prison Nation



(And if you don't have a Kindle, these books are also available in paper).

Any good books you've been reading lately, that you'd like to share?

(I do use Amazon Associates, but not because I've made any money- because I haven't! lol! But I like that I can show a picture/link with a product when I'm blogging. Plus I do recommend Amazon.com for their low prices. That or Ebay!)  

When I last wrote about the Kindle Fire, I was still unsure, whether it would live up my expectations. There were so many conflicting articles online about what it would do or what it couldn't do.

I've had my Kindle Fire for a little over 2 months now and I can say it has definitely lived up to my expectations. I absolutely LOVE it. The 7 inch touch screen is really vibrant. I love it's compact size. It's a bit heavier than I expected it to be, but I've gotten used to it.

I love that even if I'm waiting for my train in the freezing cold with gloves on- the touch screen responds! I don't even have to take my gloves off! That is so neat to me, considering most touch screens won't respond when you have gloves on! The keyboard is a nice size when you have your Kindle Fire in landscape mode, it's almost like typing on a real keyboard. I've heard people have had issues with the sensitivity of the touch screen, but I haven't had any.


It's true that you don't have access to the actual Android Market. You have to go through the Amazon App Store, but they have been pretty good at adding all of the apps I normally use. Plus they offer a free paid app every day for free! I've gotten a few good ones that way! (Monopoly, Drawing Pad). I also own Sim City Deluxe and the graphics are amazing on that!

My Apps

I use my Kindle Fire every day on the train and at home. I love that on the train I can use my T-mobile Sidekick 4G as a mobile router so I can browse the internet on my Kindle Fire when there are no hot spots available. (I have unlimited high speed internet from T-mobile). Plus I'm lucky that when I'm waiting for my train home, 30th Street Station has free wi-fi!

My library offers free e-books now. So I'm constantly checking out books. There's also a lot of free books & classics available in the Amazon Kindle store. And I've also purchased a few books.

Just some of my books.

The Kindle Fire only has 6GB of internal storage. I have a bunch of books, 1 movie, photos, music & apps installed, and I still have 3GB left. Plus I love the Amazon Cloud Storage. You can store unlimited music on your cloud drive. (You can only access your cloud drive when connected to the internet). The other neat thing about the cloud storage is if you remove a book or app from your Kindle Fire, it will still be in your cloud drive- to be downloaded again when you want it.

My music

Movies I've downloaded from Amazon.

I love that I have access to Netflix & Pandora. I only used the Amazon Prime for the free month Amazon gave me. (I still love my Netflix, there's more variety). With headphones the sound on the Kindle Fire is amazing! Very rich sound & bass. Without headphones... I wish they had included two more speakers on each side, because you do have to turn the volume up to it's maximum to hear shows well. (Sometimes I plug in a portable speaker when watching movies without headphones).

I've tried out a few magazine subscriptions on my Kindle from the Amazon newstand... though I still prefer paper magazines. The actual paper subscriptions are much cheaper too.


The Amazon Silk browser, isn't as fast as Firefox or Internet Explorer. But it does support flash. I have run into a few websites that weren't compatible with Silk, so they showed up a bit funny. (Wouldn't scroll right, etc). But for the most part I can browse more websites on my Kindle Fire than compared to my cell phones browser. Facebook & Twitter are viewed in the mobile Android format.


All in all, I've had no regrets on purchasing my Kindle Fire. It's an amazing little device. I take it with me everywhere. I don't regret that it doesn't have a camera or microphone- my cell phone has those anyway. The pro's definitely outweigh the few con's I've mentioned. The price was also a factor in my purchasing it. You can't go wrong for $199! It is worth every dollar!

I pre-ordered an Amazon Kindle Fire a few weeks ago. I've always liked the Kindle, but I said I would never get one until they were color. I like the e-book concept but for something so pricy I want to be able to do more than just read books on it. Amazon store credit offered 6 months with no interest on purchases over $150 so I applied and was approved. Still at $199, it's about half the price of other color e-readers & tablets currently available. Now to wait for the Kindle Fire to be released! (Nov 15th).

The Kindle Fire is going to operate on Android OS. But a few of the articles online have me a bit worried because it seems like we may not have access to the actual Android Market, but have to download apps through the Amazon App Store. The screenshot shows a Facebook App icon, but there's no Facebook App available through the Amazon App Store. So they are either going to be adding more apps before the release of the Kindle Fire, or perhaps Facebook is already built into the Kindle Fire?

I guess we will see...  besides being able to read books, I want to be able to browse the internet, blog, access Facebook, Twitter, etc. I would like to be able to watch Netflix. I love the idea that I could access my online recipes and be able to cook in the kitchen without dragging my laptop downstairs. This is what I want out of the Kindle Fire. Kindle Fire owners will be given a free month trial to Amazon Prime which has unlimited movies & TV shows, but a lot of the shows I watch aren't available yet, but Netflix has them! (Family Ties, Malcolm in the Middle, Bernie Mac, etc).

Owners of the Kindle Fire will have unlimited Amazon Cloud Storage. I started uploading all of my music today. I like that you will have unlimited cloud storage for musics, apps, books, etc. The Kindle Fire will only have 8GB of internal space. (Of course you'll have to have a working wi-fi connection to access your files!) It doesn't really bother me that the Kindle Fire will not have a camera/web cam. I have my phone or camera to take pictures. And I rarely ever Skype.

One of the things I love is that my local library now has an e-book site! So I can check out free books and read them on the Kindle. I've actually started taking out books to read on the Android Kindle App on my phone. It's a bit smaller to read books on my phone; but I'm really enjoying it so I can't wait to read them on the Kindle Fire which has a bigger screen!

I guess it remains to be seen whether the Kindle Fire will live up to my expectations. If not I suppose I can always return it and get a Nook Color. :-p

Edited to add: Amazon released a statement this week (11/11/11) that the Kindle Fire will have access to Netflix, Twitter, Facebook, Pandora apps! :-)

(I do use Amazon Associates, but not because I've made any money- because I haven't! lol! But I like that I can show a picture/link with a product when I'm blogging. Plus I do recommend Amazon.com for their low prices. That or Ebay!)

Tonight Irene passes over Philadelphia. Philadelphia is under a hurricane warning. They say it will be the worst storm in 50 years. Lot's of flooding.

SEPTA is suspending all service for the first time ever. Where we are just outside Philadelphia, we are under a tropical storm warning. But there are still flooding threats and we could lose power... hoping we don't though.

(Photo Credit.)

And just this week we had an earthquake too! (Though I was napping and didn't feel it. I thought my husband was teasing me when I woke up!) What in the world is going on?! All of the things I told my husband we don't get, we're getting! I told him he must have brought this extreme weather with him from the Philippines, lol! :-p

I hope things are okay weather wise later this week for our overnight vacation in down town Philadelphia for my birthday. I hope the trains are running by then and that we'll still be able to take the Duck Boat tour that we prepaid for.

I got a new cell phone on eBay for my birthday! I was able to get a T-mobile Sidekick 4G for $300.00 less then T-mobile is selling it for. (I'm on a special $49.99 unlimited plan- but the catch was I have to pay full price for a new phone).

The phone I won was in pristine condition. It still has the factory protector stickers on it. The guy who was selling it had switched to another carrier. I can actually watch my Netflix on my phone now with the Netflix App! So cool! And the battery lasts way longer than my Motorola Charm battery did. I had to switch batteries mid day with that phone. The Sidekick also has a touch screen and a keyboard, which I need, I can't do those touch screen keyboards! :-p


Please stop by and give your congratulations to my Sister in Law on her blog! She & her husband had their baby girl, Zia on 08/21/11. So now F.B. is an Uncle and I'm an Aunt. :-p

(Photo Credit: Zei & Rich).

And, just some cute pictures of the ratties to finish off with! ♥♥♥

Baby Violet

Mister Curry Wigglesworth, lol. (Picnik)

As you've noticed, I've also changed my blog layout. I think the blue matches my header banner better!