Today is World Book Day and Merimbula’s booksellers express the greatness of books.

With reference to kindles, iPads and e-books Simon Saunders of Time Machine Bookshop said that people should simply enjoy the “tactile sensation of a book opposed to pressing a button.” 

“You don’t have to charge it up, you can pick up a book and open it any time you want,” he said.

“For people who sit in front of a computer screen for 12 hours a day it is enjoyable to come home and read a book, it can help you sleep at night too.”

Booktique owner Shane Grace said books will live on forever. 

“I think the tide has turned, technology has wound back. Teenage kids have swung around to read hard copy books rather than kindles and online,” he said. 

“I worked in the book industry in the 80’s when they said that the information highway is coming, and that it was going to kill books.

“Well it didn’t, it has survived. Books are very durable you know. There is always going to be a place for them, they just have to adapt a bit,” he said.

The personal pleasure of a book you have purchased can be a door to a different world, Mr Grace said that “a book is cheap entertainment.”

“However long it takes you to read a book, it may be a week, you can be lost in a different world for that week.”

So, why not pour yourself a glass of wine tonight and celebrate world book day by flicking through a chapter of a bounded beauty.