From Bookstores to Online Bookstores; the Business of Books is No More so Simple

The word book store brings in to our mind, the picture of racks filled with books with many people moving around in search of their favourite authors. They bring out the fragrance of books which takes us to another world. The world of letters, the world of feelings, the world of emotions.

Why does a person read? It has always been difficult question to answer. Different persons have different feelings from reading. While some read for mere pleasure, some read to gather information. Some search the books for any relevant topic that is the need of the time. But of course, every one has a reason for it. No doubt, books have played a role in building a man.

Without the habit of reading, a man will remain uncultured and uncivilised similar to an animal. Abraham Lincoln, the former president of the United States of America, has once commented on the books that some books are there to chew, some to eat, some to digest while some books are just to taste. It could be simply understood by going through the books kept in the shelves in a book stall. Divided in to a variety of categories, you can find, thousands of books kept arranged giving out the fragrance of pages. Just go near and smell it. Yes you could feel it. Each page and each book will give you the fragrance of different topics that may make you ecstatic. Here comes the word of Abraham Lincoln. The importance of books may vary from person to person and his preference may change from another. There may be craps and trashes to epics and legends that may play different role in life of a voracious reader.

Just have a glance on the near by book shop and you can find some really interesting visuals there. Some people while love to intake the fragrance of books, others love to just pen the books and have a glance at the lines. Of course, many come for a particular author or title. Interestingly there are big groups who have no time to search and spend for books. They come for a particular title, availability of which they check at the counter and get it no time. Of course, all fall into the category of book lovers.

From where had the idea of book stores began from? Clearly no idea. May be dates back to centuries. The concept of book shops really groomed in the post First World War period bringing a new air into the mind of book lovers.

Later part of the century witnessed a revolution in this concept around the world, bringing new brand names exclusively into it. Today, there are giant brands in this field that cater the books dealing with wide topics around the world reaping heavy profits. The concept of book selling is no more a small business but it involves millions of dollars with new business plans and operational methodology.

With the arrival of internet and online shopping things have taken a new turn. The trend in internet online marketing is online bookstores whereby the book lovers can order books by sitting in home itself. This reduces the effort of searching the shop, visiting there and selecting the title, which is much time consuming. The user will have to just open the net and browse through various online marketing sites and there waits for him huge collection of literature that could rarely be found in the near by stores.

The user will have to no more hurry through the catalogues as enough time is available. He will have to click and book for his chosen books on his favourite topics and can avail it in mail with in a limited period of time.

While wide options like online bookshops are available with wide range of books around the globe, why do one waste time moving, and roaming in the shops where only limited collection are available.

Audio Books – from LP to MP3

Audio books are a great way to use ‘empty’ time. Load an audio book into your MP3 player or iPod – you can find audio books for just about any interest, from novels to business books and audio books about self-improvement to even the bible or the coran. You can find them 24 hours a day, just by clicking a few buttons on your computer and an internet shop delivers the contents for your iPod or MP3 player conveniently to you.

Even if they have only become very popular again recently, the concept of audio books goes back about eighty years! Initially books on tape or on LP’s were produced for the blind. Here’s a short look back in history:

Already in the 1920’s, the Royal National Institute for the Blind in England (RNIB) initiate research to find the best way to produce audio books for blind soldiers that were the result of the World War I battles. They finally decide to produce audio books on LP’s and the first ones were made in 1926. To play them they were put on the old fashioned LP players that had to be cranked by hand and delivered the sound through the big horn. This was a great development for the blind, but was hardly used by normal consumers. So these audio books from RNIB remained a niche product and never reached the masses.

The concept was successful and in 1936 the Royal National Institute for the Blind launched the ‘Talking Book Service’. The first two books they produced were:’The murder of Roger Ackroyd’ (Agatha Christie) and ‘Thyphoon’ (Joseph Conrad). Because the records could only hold 25 minutes of spoken text, an average audio book had to be recorded on an average of ten records.

During WWII, the studio used by the RNIB was bombed, and one month later a replacement studio was bombed as well, destroying much needed equipment to continue the production. The American Foundation for the Blind (AFB), who had started to produce audio books in the USA sent replacement parts and equipment to London so that the production could be taken up again.

The old fashioned LP’s were replaced by modern LP’s and finally cassettes, making listening to audio books more convenient. Sony’s Walkman made it possible to take your audio book with you and listen on the go. This is when audio books started to be bought by the general consumers. The next step was to produce these listening books on CD, making them even more convenient.

Over the last few years the audio book technology has made a quantum leap: Digital MP3 files can be packed onto a player that weighs only a few grams and runs on a set of batteries for many hours. The most popular player is without doubt the Apple iPod, but there are many other MP3 players on the market that have helped to make listening to content on the go very popular.

Finding an audio book is as easy as typing an address into your internet browser, consulting the catalog of the audio book shop and then downloading your audio book within minutes. No more need to visit your local library or book shop. If you want to shop at 3 am – no problem, the shop is open 24 hours!

One shop that offers a wide variety of audio books is the AudioBooksCorner Store. High quality audio books from publishers like BBC, Hachette and many others cover a wide variety of topics. Best selling authors offer their books as audio books and the well known foreign language courses by Pimsleur are available for download too.

Buy Hadith challenge Game from Goodwords Islamic books store

The Hadith Challenge made by Goodword Islamic Books is contained in an attractive purple cover. This game has a purple coloured board with pictures. The instruction pamphlet contains an introduction and rules of the game.

This game poses great questions for thinking minds. This Islamic book store has brought out a unique game based on the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad. The game aims at providing children with fun and education simultaneously. All questions are based on the actual sayings of Prophet Muhammad.  Children particularly will enjoy answering questions in this game.

We may now consider some of the important sayings or hadith of Prophet Muhammad.

1.  Greed and faith can never exist together in the human heart.

2.  God loves those believers who labour to earn a living through lawful means.

3.  When you see sycophants throw dust in their faces.

4.  Keep your faith pure. Even the smallest good deed will suffice.

5.  When a person repents, God’s pleasure at this is even greater than that of one who dismounts from his camel, loses it in the desert and then finds it again all of a sudden.

The objective of this game is to be the first player to finish his or her faithful journey. There are over a hundred cards with questions divided into three categories. Each category on the playing board is represented by a symbol. Two or more players or teams can play this game at a time. The player learns while playing the game about the basic teachings of Prophet Muhammad, moral values and general questions.

For starting the game all players place their pawns at the ‘Start’ sign on the playing board. Before starting the game, the cards should be shuffled and placed beside the playing board. Players should decide among themselves who should begin the game.

This game is the creation of best selling author, Saniyasnain Khan who has written numerous books for children on Islamic themes of which over a million copies have been sold worldwide. The author has brought out other interesting board games such as the Quran Challenge, The Great Mosque Game, The Hajj Fun Game, and the Madinah Salat Fun Game. These games have been brought out in different languages for an international audience. These games acquaint us with different aspects of the Islamic faith. They are useful for all those interested in gaining  knowledge of Islam.

The Hadith Challenge is another notable addition to the series of games that have given an edge to this Islamic book shop in increasing its appeal to a wide audience.

Looking for Arabic Books to Learn Arabic? Learn from “Introducing Arabic” by Michael Mumisa and “Europe speaks Arabic” by V.Abdur

Introducing Arabic by Michael Mumisa and Europe speaks Arabic by V.Abdur Rahim aim at giving us an introduction to different aspects of Arabic.

 

Introducing Arabic presents some of the basic as well as advanced laws of Arabic in simple language and method. It is based on three celebrated classical sources; the Sharh Ibn Aqil by Ibn Aqil, Awdah al-Masalik by Ibn Hisham an-Nahwi and the Muqaddimah al-Ajrumiyyah by Ibn Ajrum. This book will benefit those who have just begun learning Arabic or are at an advanced stage of their studies. The book has an attractive blue cover.

 

This book has well defined chapters on grammar such as concepts of the noun, verb and particle in Arabic speech, different types of pronouns, nouns, agents and particles.

 

This book seeks to do away with the contradiction of learners being able to construct complex grammar rules but being unable to make simple sentences in Arabic. It adopts the approach that Arabic is an easy language but the teaching methods are not modern and need to be changed. As part of the method of teaching Arabic using modern methods it identifies five stages, namely, listening, speech, reading, writing and the stage of grammar laws.

 

This book therefore tries to make basic and advanced grammar rules reachable to the learner.

 

Europe speaks Arabic aims at making a catalogue of words in common between Arabic and European languages. This Islamic book shop through this Islamic book thus shows us the way in which Arabic has contributed to Europe. It is not a catalogue of words but is a lively discussion based on linguistic evidence, enriched with literary quotations and characterised by a regard and respect for each other’s culture and views. This book opens up new worlds of fascinating information in the domains of etymology, phonetic change and semantic development.

 

The table of contents is organised into important chapters on History, Mathematics, Astronomy, Entertainment and Amusement, Clothing, Fruits and Vegetables, Drinks, Alchemy, the Animal Kingdom etc.

 

This book attempts to tell readers of these common words in a non-technical manner. Only words recognized by European linguists as borrowings from Arabic and mentioned in reputed dictionaries are included in this book.

Various dictionaries have been consulted by the author such as The Oxford English Dictionary, The New Shorter Oxford English, Oxford Concise Dictionary of English, Webster’s New Universal Unabridged Dictionary, Chamber’s twentieth Century Dictionary and Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary.

 

These books thus give us an understanding of the structure of Arabic as well as its contribution to Europe.

Avail Cheap Books from Internet Portals and Get Loads of Enjoyment and Information!!!

There is no need to mention about the importance of books. It is a well-known fact from centuries that books are the attribute, importance of which can never be decreased. Either you have to get the information about various topics, or you simply want to have fun, these paperbacks serve you as your best companions.

But what about those who are unable to afford the books due to their high prices? Now, those people can also get the enjoyment from paperbacks with the help of cheap books. These days, there are a number of online and offline stores from where you can get the inexpensive paperbacks. Several firms provide handsome discounts on these, especially on educational books.

Arrival of Internet has made it easy to avail these cheap books. There are several Internet sites on which cheap books on romance, fiction horror and more, are available. You can visit five types of websites for this purpose – sites of publication, sites of book shops, online books stores, other online retailers and affiliate websites.

On the sites of publication, you can get various discounts on the paperbacks published by a particular firm. On the other hand, some book stores have also launched their sites and are offering the books at discounted price in order to attract the people. On the other hand, there are several online book stores and online retailers websites also from where these paperbacks can be purchased.

Most active ones we can see today are the affiliate websites. On many of these sites, there is a facility called ‘price comparison’. This feature allows you to compare the prices of the books available at different websites, under one roof. Therefore, you can easily judge which of these sites is offering the paperbacks at cheapest rate. Some of these sites allow the individuals to upload the deals and make the cheap books available to other readers.

Apart, these sites facilitate the individuals to add the reviews and blogs. Therefore, you can get unbiased information about the content of the paperbacks. You also can give the guidance to other readers with the help of this feature.

Advancement in technology has created a new form of book, which his called ‘ebook’. These are the books that can be read or downloaded from Internet. These are available either free of cost, or at very low prices. So if you are an Internet savvy then you can get these books also at very low prices.

The categories are so many that it is very difficult to explain them in a limited space. Some of these categories are all time favourite. Books on romance are the subject of interest for readers from centuries. Horror books create thrill in the minds of individuals. Books based on fiction are liked by the children as well as adults. These include the books of science fiction, fairy tales etc. Books on spirituality are the subject of devotion from ancient times.

There is no doubt that these books will keep on giving the pleasure to the people also in the coming centuries. In case you get cheap (inexpensive) books, then it will be like ‘icing on the cake’.

So you can buy cheap books on romance, fiction, humour, history, food & drink, audio cassettes and more