The Kindle 2 has become one of my closest companions. I love to read and find this device to be absolutely fantastic. As you can see if you blow up the picture I’ve provided, I have three pages of books, including one full audio book, on my Kindle.
With Kindle, ordering books is as simple as clicking on “Menu”, “Turn Wireless On”, “Shop in Kindle Store”, search for or otherwise choose a book you are interested in, and viola; you book appears almost immediately via Amazon’s “whispernet”. I downloaded the complete works of William Shakespeare in under 1 minute!
As I alluded to earlier, the Kindle is not only great for reading (you can change the size of the print), but it automatically bookmarks where you leave off, in case you forget to. It can be used to read along with as you listen to a fairly reasonable voice reading along on most standard books. For books by Audible.com, the sound quality is excellent, and the books are read by professional readers, who you can listen to directly from the Kindle’s built in speaker or through a headset of your choice. I use Bose noise cancelling head phones and find them comfortable, great for blocking what would otherwise be distracting noise, and a good excuse for not quite getting all of what my wife is saying when I’m not feeling particularly ambitious. 
In addition to books, I’ve also subscribed to several blogs and newspapers in order to keep myself informed no matter where I may be when I find myself enjoying free moments. The keyboard also allows you to take notes for later use and the machine has a built-in dictionary should you come across a word that is unfamiliar to you.
I’m not saying that this is necessarily a good thing, but if you have a child who is having difficulty reading and comprehending what is on the pages, you may find it helpful to him or her to have the read along capability to use as a tool for building up concentration and comprehension skills.
At any rate, I love my Kindle (I’ve had it since the first release) and can’t imaging being without it.
Since I purchased my Kindle, however, there have been several other companies releasing wireless readers: Sony has finally added wireless connection to their reader and now Barnes and Noble have a reader out, but due to a backlog in manufacturing, none are expected to make it to market except as a pre-order until mid to late January 2010.
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays to all!
–Rick
