Books in Real Life are as popular as they are
in Second Life. It is a way for people to either educate themselves. Flick
threw magazines for inspiration or to get away and engulf themselves in another
world or life.
The Book Island owned by Selina Greene who
cleverly came up with the idea of a sim totally dedicated to books and other
reading format. Book Island has incorporated the book club idea and taken it to
another level; where others can immerse themselves in books or discuss
literature with others. Other activities include socializing at events hosted
on Book Island.
Selina was kind enough to sit down with me
and chat about her creation and how Book Island came about.
Piers. Hi Selina, can you tell us a bit
about yourself?
Selina: I've been in SL since early 2007 and have had
Book Island since May 2007. I came in here originally to publicize my now
defunct RL publishing company back at the time when a lot of RL firms were coming
into SL for similar reasons so I created my storefront and no one came, so I
figured that if there were more of us - ie more publishers, authors, writers in
one place, perhaps people would take note and that was how the idea of Book
Island was initially conceived, on the mainland. Since then, I've been obviously very
involved with Book Island, but on the side, I've done a bit of modeling, I've
been breeding horses for a while and I also happened to meet my now RL husband
here in SL back when we were both noobs!
Piers: How did Book Island start? Also,
it has been around for a few years now.
What do you think is the reason for your success?
Selina: Nods - I believe, although I'm not
certain, that Book Island is the oldest surviving literary sim on the grid. I
think that's down to one thing - our community here. We have a lot of very
talented and accomplished writers, poets, blogger s and publishers on the
island, both as renters and as event attendees. We have a number of events to
serve this community, run by the community. It's basically the people here that
keep Book Island alive. We're a friendly bunch smile
Piers: You have live events here at Book
Island, what type do you host and how did this start out?
Selina:
We’ve been doing events pretty much since we started although the frequency and
number of events has waxed and waned over the years. I'll pass you our weekly
schedule in a bit so you can see what we're currently doing. We have a wide
variety of events these days - from open mic events to a twice monthly dance,
improv workshops (which are a scream), memoir writing workshops, live writing
events and Shakespeare reading circles. We also have two very popular chat
groups - writer's chat and reader's chat where people can just talk about what
they're writing and reading So it's a pretty diverse set of events as with
everywhere in SL, we're a very international set but I think that we're a bit
older than average in SL.
Piers. With books in real life becoming
digitized on apps and kindle, do you feel this is a good way to introduce more
people to reading? Or do you feel there is nothing like having a real book in
your hand?
Selina: I made the jump to a Kindle
relatively recently - about 18 months ago, eschewing a tablet for real paper,
but now I have one, I'm hooked. I think SL is a great environment to promote
books because of the 3D environment but also because of the ease of presenting
links for direct download.
Interestingly, when we first started out, we would see a lot more
in-world readable books in our resident's shops but I think SL is going the same
way - we're seeing fewer (virtual) 'real' books and more links to kindles and
ebook formats In fact, this and many other issues are addressed in one of our
weekly events, BookBiz, hosted by Jacksonarthur - helping writers pick through
the minefield of how to present their books.
Piers: When you are not busy working in
second life, what do you like to do in your spare time?
Selina: Well, I spend a lot of spare time
with friends, many of whom are Book Island community members. But I also breed
horses and have done since their heyday, which was quite lucrative. Other than
that, I like to shop for vintage clothes and tinker with my home sim here and
there. In RL, I am a full time mother these days so SL can wind up being a link
with sanity in the evenings and nap times!
Piers. What is next for you and Book
Island?
Selina: As far as the next year goes, more of
the same really - more events, more community, more connections. I think I'll probably continue with the sim
remodel which I started earlier this year.
To find out more on Book Island and about
Events being hosted at Book Island Teleport today!
Join
the Book Island group for event information
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