Kindle Daily Post

New on Kindle: Scripps Spelling Bee Word Games

The Scripps National Spelling Bee is the largest and longest running educational promotion--the 2011 edition is going to be from May 31-June 2. We’re excited to announce Scripps Spelling Bee on Kindle to coincide with the event.

Scripps Spelling Bee on Kindle offers three word games: Word Search, Honeycomb Hunt or Mystery Bee.

In Word Search, the game displays a word box with 20 words that are hidden among a grid of letters. You have 10 minutes to find all 20 words hidden in the grid.

Honeycomb Hunt is a word scramble game. You are given a list of words and a grid of hexagon blocks containing letters. The object of the game is to move the location of the letters so that all 20 words are spelled out at once. The trick is that you must move letters by rotating them without disturbing a word you had previously created.

Mystery Bee is a hangman-style game. For each wrong guess, a body part is filled in on a picture of a bee. If you need them, you can get clues such as the definition of the word, or word's origin.

Scripps Spelling Bee can be used to learn new words in 4 different levels of difficulty, and it can also help you learn your own word lists. Just type your study words into a word list, and you can use those words in the games.

Get Scripps Spelling Bee today so you can truly "Bee" a champion!

Quotation, Quotation, Quotation: Five Most Highlighted Passages

So far in the Kindle Daily Post, we haven't said much about the very cool reading and community experience at kindle.amazon.com. The site offers a rich assortment of features for bibliophiles who like to season their reading with some of the community aspect of the web. One such feature is the "Most Highlighted of All Time." With separate lists for passages and books themselves, this regularly updated, ranked list makes for a quirky barometer, by turns thought-provoking, funny, or mystifying. And since highlighted passages are by definition memorable, this Memorial Day Weekend, we bring five of the most popular right to you:

1. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
--from Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen

2. The key to your happiness is to own your slippers, own who you are, own how you look, own your family, own the talents you have, and own the ones you don’t. If you keep saying your slippers aren’t yours, then you’ll die searching, you’ll die bitter, always feeling you were promised more. Not only our actions, but also our omissions, become our destiny.
--from Cutting for Stone, Abraham Verghese

3. Those three things--autonomy, complexity, and a connection between effort and reward--are, most people agree, the three qualities that work has to have if it is to be satisfying.
--from Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell

4. Rule #1: Avoid "white" carbohydrates (or anything that can be white). Rule #2: Eat the same few meals over and over again. Rule #3: Don’t drink calories. Rule #4: Don’t eat fruit. Rule #5: Take one day off per week and go nuts.
--from The 4-Hour Body, Timothy Ferriss

5. It takes ten times as long to put yourself back together as it does to fall apart.
--from Mockingjay, Suzanne Collins

Check out kindle.amazon.com to see "Heavily Highlighted Recently," "Daily Review," "Public Notes," and more. Have a happy holiday weekend, readers.

     --Jason Kirk

Guest Blogger: Haley Tanner on "Vaclav & Lena"

Haley Tanner is the debut author of Vaclav & Lena.

Adults always ask you what you want to be when you grow up.  When I was very very young, four or five, I wanted to be an astronaut.  I wanted to see outerspace.  I wanted to see what was at the edges and what was after the stars.  After that, I wanted to be a ballerina.  I think that was mostly about the shoes and the tutu. By the time I was eight or nine, I wanted to be a writer. When I was little, and I said astronaut or ballerina, they smiled, but later, when I said “writer,” they didn't smile.  They asked questions--the kind of questions that send big and powerful messages.  The kind of questions that tell you that being a writer is an impossible thing, a difficult thing, a silly thing, and most of all, a completely ridiculous and irresponsible thing.  

I have a friend who wanted to be the man who cut the rubber-bands off the lobster-claws at Legal Seafood.  That is not impossible or difficult, but it is silly and wonderful.

When I began writing Vaclav & Lena, I was not a “capital-W” Writer. I was a tutor, struggling to pay rent, dragging my laundry to the laundromat up and down a five-story walk up. People I knew, people my own age, were starting to get jobs that paid real money--they were starting to buy houses.  They had nice shoes.  I was making up stories.  I wanted to spend time with someone who wanted something as badly as I did, someone who wanted something as impossible and difficult and silly and wonderful as I did, and Vaclav showed up, announcing his magic act, and that he would one day be the world’s greatest magician.  I wanted to believe him;  I was Lena, quietly hoping to hitch my wagon to Vaclav’s fantastic confidence.

When Vaclav and Lena spoke they sounded like the kids I was tutoring at the time, the heavy Russian so surprising in their tiny mouths.  I started writing about them and I saw them everywhere, all over the subways and the streets of Brighton Beach, in the supermarkets and the dollar stores.  I dragged my laundry and  groceries up and down, and I kept writing, and Vaclav and Lena kept practicing their act.  Once I met them, I wanted to spend more time with them--I got to know them and I had to tell their story.  My story is not their story, but in so many ways their story became part of my life.  Their hope and drive inspired me--I felt that I had to do right by them, to keep showing up at the page every day, no matter how impossible or difficult it felt.  Vaclav and Lena's love grew all on its own, and I began to identify with Vaclav's mother, wanting so badly to protect them, while giving them freedom to pursue impossible dreams.  

I never thought anything would come of my humble urge to tell stories--and then Vaclav and Lena stood tall, announced their act, and taught me that anything is possible--especially the silly, the difficult, the impossible and the wonderful. I'm grateful for everything they taught me, and I hope you enjoy their story.

50% off Workout Partners on Kindle

Get Anywhere Legs, Anywhere Abs and My Yoga Studio for just $0.99 each. These workout partners will guide you step-by-step through exercise routines. Each exercise has a detailed description, pictures, and a countdown timer to help you complete your workout. The exercises don't require any special equipment and can be performed anywhere there is space on the floor. It's perfect for the frequent traveler or for home use.

Anywhere Legs offers 3 routines, each consisting of 6 timed exercises that tone the major muscle groups in your legs. Each routine has a beginner, intermediate, and advanced level, and can be completed in just 6-10 minutes.

Anywhere Abs offers 2 routines, each consisting of 6 timed exercises to strengthen your core.

 

My Yoga Studio includes 25 different poses. You can use one of three included routines (Sun Salutation, Stress Melter, or Balance & Peace), do poses individually, or create your own custom routine.

 

With Anywhere Legs, Anywhere Abs and My Yoga Studio, your workout partner is as close as your Kindle. (50% off sale ends June 05).

Guest Blogger: Margaret Robison on "The Long Journey Home"

My 87-year-old friend told me that she’s not at all the same person she was when she was young. She said her mother told her that as an old woman she’d felt the same way she’d felt at 26. My own mother said that when she was in her 70’s she still felt the same way inside she’d felt when she was 16. In my mid-70’s I don’t feel at all like the person I was when I was young. Life’s experiences continue to change me.

I spent over 10 years writing The Long Journey Home, a memoir about my life as a child and continuing through my college experiences, my years as a young married woman with two sons--one with Asperger’s--and a middle-aged woman who had several psychotic episodes that required hospitalization, and much later a stroke and recovery from that stroke. Looking back at some of my experiences, I can’t imagine the person I am now doing some of the things I did when I was younger. A part of me is inclined to judge myself harshly for doing some of those things. I am filled with sorrow at the people I hurt along the way, my sons in particular. Another part of me is grateful that I lived through those experiences to come out of them a wiser, more loving person. Certainly there are many ways to mature creatively, emotionally, and spiritually. Writing my memoir was one of my most important ways.

Writing about my life often evoked such intense emotions that I became exhausted from the effort. After days or weeks of that intensity I would take a break and turn to writing poetry. Sitting in my wheelchair on my porch facing the Deerfield River, I would lose myself in the joy of contemplating the way sunlight danced on ripples of water or the way a single small cloud floated in the blue above me.  Then, once again, I would turn to working on The Long Journey Home. Did I really do that? I asked myself as I wrote one thing or another. Yes, I did that, I answered myself and searched for words of description. I was grateful when I felt compassion for myself instead of condemnation, pride instead of shame. And if I realized something about myself or about life itself, I was grateful that I found myself changed for the better.

And what about the harm done to me--both physical and mental--or other difficult, painful experiences? I struggled to find words to describe those experiences, just as I had struggled physically to survive them. And now the memories no longer haunt me.  Words can heal, after all.

Words can also encourage and inspire, and I hope the words of my memoir will do that for readers.  After my son’s memoir Running with Scissors was published, sometimes troubled parents and young people would write to me at my website for support, and I’m grateful I have had the opportunity to be of help.  I hope my own story will give hope to people suffering from their own traumas.  For most of my life, I never imagined that I would ever reach the place of peace I’ve found, that in my old age I would be able to sit contentedly at my kitchen table and welcome the day--birds singing in the dim light of dawn, the sun rising over the distant hills, and always, always the river flowing past my window. And laughter. I am eternally gratefully for laughter.

Guest Blogger: Steve Berry on "The Jefferson Key"

Steve Berry is the New York Times bestselling author of The Emperor's Tomb, The Paris Vendetta, The Charlemagne Pursuit, The Venetian Betrayal, The Alexandria Link, The Templar Legacy, The Third Secret, The Romanov Prophecy, and The Amber Room--as well as the e-book original short stories The Balkan Escape and The Devil's Gold.  His latest book--The Jefferson Key--released on May 17.

There's a fine line between pirates and privateers.  The former is a criminal, working outside the law, the latter is a mercenary, hired by law through an officially-issued letter of marque.  Pirates were hunted and executed by kings, queens, presidents, and emperors.  Privateers were rewarded with a lion's share of all the booty they seized and a grateful nod from their government.  Of course, privateering was nothing more than legalized pirating, quite common in 1787 when delegates gathered in Philadelphia to address problems associated with the recently enacted Articles of Confederation.  But those delegates discovered that the defects were too great, so they discarded the Articles and drafted a new Constitution of the United States.  Contained within Article 1, Section 8 was some explicit language:  The Congress shall have the power to . . . grant letters of marque and reprisal and make rules concerning captures on land and water.

I first noticed this unique language in law school.  I recall doing some research on the clause, filing away what I learned in the back of my brain.  It would be 33 years before I explored the subject further.  By then, Cotton Malone had been born (in The Templar Legacy) and had endured five other adventures (The Alexandria Link, The Venetian Betrayal, The Charlemagne Pursuit, The Paris Vendetta, and The Emperor's Tomb).  While I was thinking about his seventh, wanting for the first time to bring Cotton home from Europe for an American tale, I came across an article about a cipher Thomas Jefferson had used, one he considered nearly unsolvable.  In fact, it remained an enigma until 2009 when it was finally cracked with the aid of modern computers.  Then I read about presidential assassinations and the first attempt on a chief executive's life in 1835.  Two guns were pointed straight at Andrew Jackson. Both misfired.  Four other presidents were not as lucky, dying in 1865, 1881, 1901, and 1963.  

And I wondered: What if those deaths were all related?  

And what if the reason those presidents died was because of that clause contained in Article 1, Section 8?

That's how The Jefferson Key was born.  

It's a great adventure, taking Cotton Malone from North Carolina to Nova Scotia.  Along the way Cotton encounters a group of modern day American pirates.  And not the Hollywood stereotypes we've come to recognize.  These are the real thing, acting and reacting as in their golden years of the late 17th and early 18th centuries, when their sloops roamed the ocean in search of wealth.  Pirate communities were the first democracies, and there are some uncanny parallels between how they governed themselves and how we now govern each other.

So check out The Jefferson Key and enjoy the ride.

Three New York Times Bestselling Authors Join the Ranks of Kindle Singles

Honesty is a writer’s most valuable asset--and a characteristic on abundant display in our wonderful assortment of recent Kindle Singles.

The week began with a bold, no-holds-barred essay, The Enemy, from the acid pen of Christopher Hitchens--what the Vanity Fair columnist and bestselling author described as an obituary for Osama bin Laden.  Hitchens delivered an essay with the unfiltered feel of an emotional diary entry, backed by a litany of evidence to support the Abbottabad raid that left Al-Qaeda without its leader.   What a wondrous feeling to see that even in his struggle with esophageal cancer, Hitchens’ battle against the forces of world terrorism rages on.

What was it like to be Plum Sykes in college? The author of Bergdorf Blondes came clean in our next  Kindle Single, Oxford Girl-–a narrative recollection of the social minefields of one of the world’s great universities.  There’s great fun in hearing the true, semi-sordid tales of the novelist’s early transformation from awkward child to social animal. Her hilarity flows so naturally that you know it’s all true--no one, not even Plum Sykes, could make this stuff up.

From dogs to chickens to donkeys to goats: the progression of New Yorker writer Susan Orlean from animal lover to menagerie keeper is comically chronicled in Animalish, a Kindle Single from one of America’s leading journalists.  It began with Molly, her dog in college, and has become a singular obsession – a saga that rings utterly true, thanks to Orlean’s capacity to confess her deepest feelings in eloquent riffs.  The author of “The Orchid Thief” here redefines “animal lover” in ways that would make Doctor Dolittle feel vaguely jealous.

--David Blum

Bonhoeffer: Paying the Ultimate Price for Faith in Nazi Germany

The editors at Kindle recently had the privilege to ask Eric Metaxas questions about his new bestselling biography Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy.

Amazon.com: Who was Dietrich Bonhoeffer?

Eric Metaxas: He was a German pastor and theologian who spoke out against the Nazis and eventually got involved in the plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler. He was killed by the Nazis in a concentration camp three weeks before the end of the war. He's also famous for writing two classic works of devotional literature, The Cost of Discipleship (paperback) and Life Together (paperback).

Amazon.com: What led you to write a biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer?

Eric Metaxas: I'd first heard of Bonhoeffer in the summer of 1988 and was simply amazed by his story. I was baffled that I'd never heard it before. It haunted me for years, not least because my mother is German and lived through the war, and because my grandfather was killed in the war at age 32, reluctantly fighting for a regime he hated. My mother was nine. The idea that Bonhoeffer stood up for the Jews because of his Christian faith staggered me, and I always thought that someday I would dig deeper into his life. The fact that he spent so much time in New York, where I live, also compelled me to look at his life. His monumentally brave decision to leave New York for Germany in 1939 alone makes him a fascinating figure.

Amazon.com: How was Bonhoeffer unique among pastors and theologians?

Eric Metaxas: Bonhoeffer's writings and his whole life were uniquely integrated. One sees that his life is the very incarnation of his theology. For him--and this is the main point--if you don't live the things you claim to believe, you don't really believe them at all. He believed what he wrote and what he taught, and his life and death are the spectacular and clear evidence of that. And the story of his life helps us to think about who we are and what we believe and why. A life like his can't help but be deeply inspiring. You almost can't believe it, but the evidence is there.

Amazon.com: Bonhoeffer attempted to assassinate Hitler. How did he justify murder with his Christian beliefs? 

Eric Metaxas: He didn't necessarily justify it. He was never one hundred percent sure that it was the right thing to do. But his position was that if he was wrong, he cast himself on God's mercy, because even though he couldn't be completely sure it was God's will, he knew that he couldn't shrink from action, just because he had some doubt. That would be far worse.

On the other hand, he would have justified it by asking us questions, such as what would we do if a drunk driver is killing pedestrians left and right on a busy street? Do we stop him if it means killing him? That's what he saw happening with the Third Reich. Something had to be done, for the sake of the innocents being killed. Also, let's be clear that the bible condemns murder, but it doesn't condemn all killing, else it would imply that David was wrong in killing Goliath, which it obviously doesn't. David didn't murder Goliath, but he did kill him. There's a world of difference.

Amazon.com: Can you tell us about the process of writing this book?

Eric Metaxas: It was an unspeakably intense experience, one I wish never to repeat, nor much to remember, frankly. It was like sprinting twenty-six point two miles. I thought my heart would burst. That it didn't is something of a miracle. Who can really fathom the creative process?

Amazon.com: How did your own faith intersect with writing this book?

Eric Metaxas: In many ways. First of all I first heard of Bonhoeffer the summer I returned to faith in 1988, four years after graduating from Yale, which is a very secular environment. I was amazed that a man, because of his Christian faith had stood up for the Jews and had died in a concentration camp. That level of faith, of someone living it out that way, really moved me. Also, because the writing was so difficult and so intense, I've simply never prayed harder in my life. I had a sometimes palpable sense of God's presence with me as I wrote. Of course that's an extraordinary thing to say, but it's quite true.

Amazon.com: What was the most fascinating thing you learned in the process of writing Bonhoeffer?

Eric Metaxas: Where to start? Perhaps the most amazing thing was to see how seriously he took his faith all the way to the end, all the way to the gallows. Some have wrongly thought of him as turning into a type of agnostic humanist at the very end of his life, but I was amazed to see that not only was this not true, but there is overwhelming evidence that the very opposite is true. His faith in God was strong to the very day he went to his death. He even performed a service for his fellow prisoners and preached a sermon to them just eighteen hours or so before being executed. I think the evidence of this has shocked some people, who had a completely different idea of who Bonhoeffer was. It certainly surprised me.

Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy is available on Kindle for $9.90.

Eric Metaxas is the author of two New York Times bestselling biographies, Bonhoeffer and Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery. He is also the author of the Everything You Always Wanted to Know About God (but were afraid to ask) trilogy and 30 award-winning children's books, including It's Time to Sleep, My Love (hardcover). He lives in New York City with his wife and daughter.

New on Kindle: Letter Landers

Letter Landers is a letter learning game for children ages 3 and up.

In Letter Landers, 26 letter-shaped aliens help your child learn letters, short words, and practice memory skills. There are two modes, Matching and Letter Book. In the Matching game, you must flip tiles over to reveal pictures and letters underneath. Match picture or letter pairs to make the tiles disappear. Once cleared, the letter-shaped aliens spell one of 113 beginner words using the matched letters you found while clearing the tiles. There are 3 skill levels (grid sizes 3x4, 4x4 and 5x4) with best times saved for each.

The 26 page Letter Book mode features all the letter aliens. Each page introduces a letter of the alphabet, and focuses on basic letter pronunciation through use of rhyming and alliteration.

Letter Landers provides a fun way to learn on the go.

New on Kindle: Converter

Converter is a simple utility that lets you convert between different units of measure on your Kindle and answer common conversion questions. How many cups are in a quart and how many teaspoons are in a tablespoon? Having trouble converting between celsius and fahrenheit while visiting a foreign country? Quickly convert among 76 units of measure in these 11 categories:

- Angle
- Area
- Energy
- Length/Distance
- Power
- Pressure
- Speed
- Temperature
- Time
- Volume
- Weight

Converter also supports shortcuts that allow you to quickly change the type of conversion, the unit you are converting from, and the unit to which you are converting.

Let Kindle help you with conversions today!