Hope for the hardcopy book? Preston makes me think so.

This past weekend my wife and I visited our grand-nephew, Preston, about a three-hour drive away from our home here in Monterey.

Preston will soon have his first birthday and is at that age when he’s a lot of fun to be around.  He has graduated from infant to toddler in his daycare center and is almost walking.  He is no longer a baby.  What’s neat about Preston is his rather grown-up disposition.  He seems very contemplative, seemingly taking in what you say and pondering its significance.  He can keep eye contact longer than I can.  Since he can’t talk yet, he’s not to the point where he can verbalize a reply, although it’s clear that he would like to.  I predict that he will become a philosopher.

Not having been around babies in recent history, I’m amazed by the plethora of toys that have electronics built into them.  Very hi-tech.  My coolest hi-tech toy when I was that age was a rattle.  I shook it and it made noise.  Now, all that Preston has to do is bang or press on something, and it starts talking or singing a song.  Whether going through the ABCs or numbers from one to ten or reproducing the sounds of various animals, there seems to be no end to the aural stimulations available.

The point of this blog, however, is that there were some other, quieter, more conventional stimulants in his toy box: books.  These books were hardbacks, had indestructible thick pages, of which there were only about six or seven.  In one, you could poke your finger in from the back and operate a finger puppet that moved while you read the story.  And what was most encouraging was that toward the end of our visit, Preston picked up one of these books and brought it over to me, implying that I read to him.  That gave me an idea.  Since I had my latest thriller, White Thaw: The Helheim Conspiracy, sitting across the room in my briefcase, I figured I’d read from it instead.  What I wanted to say to Preston (but didn’t) was this: “Preston, the plot in your seven-page book sucks; let me read you a real story!”  But I quickly came to my senses, realizing that my book had no pictures, a seemingly important component of his.  I decided to wait a few more months before impressing him with my page-turning prose.

And so, I came away from this visit encouraged that the physical medium created when Johannes Gutenberg printed his Bible in the mid-fifteenth century will remain around a while longer.  Kindles and iPads may not take us over.   Preston didn’t hand me one of his plastic, animal-talking, kid-counting pieces of electrified silicon, but a simple book made from paper with pictures and words.  That was encouraging indeed.

Categorised in: White Thaw

This post was written by paulmarktag01