We didn't do the Kama Sutra, and now I'm left with Slips of Speech

The Kama Sutra, she suggested. Oh dear, thought I. Would I find it awkward, discussing, err, um, you know what, with a young woman just half my age. What would I know, anyway? I'm married. Have been for the past 46 years. To the same woman.

We exchanged a few more emails, and she chose again. Slips of Speech.

Perhaps I'd better explain. A few months ago, a friend, Suzanne Fleming, invited me to join a book discussion group linked to the ebook publisher Globusz. Suzanne owns GlobuszOz, the Australian arm of the international group.

After chatting with the other members, we decided to download and read different books from the Globusz catalogue and post our assessments separately to our book club blog, Writer's Cafe 101 (which you're welcome to read). To my mind, that gives each of us a reviewer's responsibilities – to discuss and evaluate the book without giving away the plot.

So far I've read two books from the Globusz catalogue. I've enjoyed, with reservations, Sand Against the Wind, an action romance set in Rome during World War II, and more wholeheartedly, The Isle of Enniskerry, in which a lottery winner buys a Scottish island long abandoned by its laird and crofters, and repopulates it with an interesting mix of characters.

A few weeks ago, Suzanne asked me to partner a new member. The idea was we'd go through a book, swap ideas and put up a post together. I'd also help the new member brush up her English – she'd spent the last twenty years living in a Mediterranean country.

Now in her mid-30s, she'd returned to New Zealand and enrolled in a university course.

We exchanged a few emails, and I could see the last thing my new partner needed was an old codger teaching her how to write proper – some 70-year-old retired hack saying split infinitives are something up with which we will not put.

In truth, this young woman (mid-30s is impossibly young to me!) had a splendid grasp of what counts in writing English – a vivid turn of phrase. I loved her description of a Greek funeral ("keening, renting of clothes, leaping into graves . . . "), and also her account of celebrating Anzac Day in New Zealand with the old veterans.

As I emailed to her, "Lively people write lively prose, boring people write boring prose, pompous people write pompous prose, etc."

Let's not be modest. I was the right person as a mentor. For most of my working life, I've been a sub-editor (copy editor, for Americans) on daily newspapers, a few times in Perth but mainly in Sydney.

One of the worst things a sub can do is take a lively story, and drain its colour by rewriting it into staid English (the worst is to take a story in which the facts are correct, and rewrite it with errors). I felt I could let my new friend's prose fly high, with only the occasional tweak from me.

Alas, she has just discovered how demanding university is for the mature-age student coming back after a long break. She's decided to drop out of our book group so she can concentrate on her uni work.

She's made the right decision, and I'm glad she has, but I hope we'll be able to swap some ideas again in holiday breaks.

But after briefly considering a manual of exotic sexual couplings, we had come back to Slips of Speech, another book one can download for free from Globusz. By John Hendricks Bechtel, it's "a helpful book for everyone who aspires to correct the everyday errors of speaking and writing."

Just the thing to help my new friend polish up her English. It is, however, a little naughty of the Globusz people not to disclose it was published in the US in 1895.

I had suggested a "he said, she said" dialogue as the way to post a lively discussion of Slips of Speech, based on an old guy mentoring a lively young writer. Alas that's not to be.

Now I have to go it alone. But all is not lost. I'm trying to find out more about John Hendricks Bechtel, and what he may have contributed to the vigour of English as it is used in the New World.

How would it compare with Dr Fowler's Modern English Usage, first published in 1926, but still a book one can enjoy by slipping into the mindset of an Oxford don of the period? Or with Strunk and White's The Elements of Style, dating back to 1918 but updated with a lively narrative.

I hope to post more thoughts soon to Writer's Cafe, so check back there in a few days.

Many of my friends cannot believe I'd enjoy reading books on my computer screen, but I do. I know this sounds like a plug, but I do find I can download a book from Globusz, then read it easily on my desktop. Globusz, and some other ebook publishers, now offer their books free. I haven't tested the others, but I expect they too would have worthwhile catalogues and often free downloads.

Obviously, one could also download to a laptop and read the book on the bus to work.

One day, many of us will use special ebook readers. They're expensive, but the price will come down. To see one that's now on offer, look at the iLiad:
http://www.dadirect.com.au/iliad/?gclid=CIT5u6PflZMCFRaVggod_1FZ2g

Leading Australian book chain Dymocks is already pushing hard into retailing ebooks:
http://www.dymocks.com.au/VirtualStore/landingPage.aspx?Store=Digital&Ne=10&N=4294967265

At the same time, Macmillan Australia has become the first conventional, mainstream Australian publisher to push into ebooks, with 400 offerings from its backlist already available for downloading. From next year, Macmillan plans to offer new books in simultaneous print and digital editions: http://www.macmillandigital.com.au/

One more book club . . . with a difference

I've just joined another book club. Not that I'm unhappy with the one I already enjoy. Just the opposite, in fact, and I hope to continue looking forward to that first Tuesday morning every month when a dozen women and yours truly meet to discuss a selected book, then enjoy more lively discussion over coffee and a light lunch.

You could say I'm the token bloke, and wonder how I managed it. Simple really. My wife Merry had been a member for years, and when I retired she took me along and introduced me to the others.

I feel honoured by my inclusion, and it's led to my reading a far wider range of authors and topics than I would have found for myself. Margaret Atwood and Janette Turner Hospital, for example, and we've listed their new books for discussion later this year.

Peter Goldsworthy, whose Three Dog Night brought on a lively discussion when I confessed admiration for the character whose actions would draw condemnation from all right thinking moralists. Susan Mitchell's revealing biography, Margaret Whitlam, for another.

One's image of a book club is of a rather prim group of ladies. Perhaps that can be true, but for me at least, this group enhances my respect for the strength, sincerity and range of opinions to be found in a group of mature and articulate women.

But even I was startled at our last meeting when one of our number (I won't name her, but will say she's a leading light in the theatre) arrived a little late, and with superb diction and a voice trained to project across a 500-seat auditorium, declaimed her lines from a local production of The Vagina Monologues.

Never say women's book clubs are dull.

I joined my new book club as a favour to a friend. It's early days, but I'm already finding it fun, and I think it will remain so.

Long ago, I wrote of Suzanne Fleming's becoming the business development manager of an international online e-book publisher, Globusz. Now she's taken what could best be called a Globusz franchise in Australia and is operating it as Globusz Oz.

This allows her to further develop her ideas. Unlike most e-book publishers, Globusz and Globus Oz allow anyone to read online or download their books without charge. The e-publisher plans to earn its revenue by charging authors a modest fee to prepare their books for online publication.

In return, Globusz Oz will encourage readers to submit evaluations of the e-books they read or download, and as part of that plan it's inviting people to join an online book club to discuss titles they select as a group.

For new authors dreaming of book tours and a handsome income, it's time for a reality check. Most mainsteam publishers have a "slush pile" -- the corner where they toss unsolicited manuscripts, unread.

Suzanne's business model will allow unknown authors to be published in cheaply produced e-books without being ripped off by vanity publishers.

For those who need hard-copy print versions to give or sell to family or friends, it will be possible to arrange limited, low-cost runs by print-on-demand services such as http://www.lulu.com./

The authors will receive feedback from readers, including some contributing via book discussion groups, with considered advice and perhaps offers of mentoring.

For some authors, the best of the crop perhaps, Suzanne's model may lead to introductions to mainstream publishers -- and fame and fortune. For others, it may give no more than the pleasure which comes from developing creative writing skills.

In our new book club, we chat by posting entries to a blog, and we're already off to a start which points to many more enjoyable conversions. You're welcome to come in and read our chat, and add your comments, but you'll need to join the club and receive a password to post new items.

To see how Suzanne's ideas develop, click on to GlobuszOz.

In my long-ago item about e-publishing , I was sceptical about its acceptance by general readers, many of whom probably still call the grandkids over to adjust their VCRs. I did see great promise with readers having special interests, or tech-savvy groups like university students who'd appreciate carrying one handheld device instead of a knapsack full of books.

Now I think the time has arrived for e-books (or is almost here for those of my generation who are not early adopters of new technology).

Faster broadband connections, more powerful computers and better monitors make it much easier to download and read e-books.

Also, geek magazines and websites are now describing a new generation of handheld e-book readers which feel like printed books and have screens which display text and images with the clarity of a printed page. On top of that they offer computer functionality for search, highlighting, bookmarking, copying and printing out.

Just as the iPod allowed people to enjoy music anywhere, these e-readers will allow people to pack a whole shelf of books into a device they can take to bed, read in the train, consult during a lecture, where and when they desire.

The main risk for our new group of readers is that some of the books will be dogs. Against that will the prospect of discovering and encouraging exciting new writers. Let's see how we go.