by Ron Vitale

The holidays are upon us. With only days to go before Christmas and Kwanzaa (or Festivus for you Seinfeld geeks out there), there aren't many days left to do your shopping. At this point, it's too late to even do Amazon prime's free two-day shipping. But fear not, you still have plenty of time to purchase an a Kindle ebook and send it to the person via email. It's easy to do.

Schedule Your Delivery

Did you know that you can purchase a Kindle edition of a book on Amazon and schedule its delivery to the person you'd like to give it to? My wife asked me the other day if it were possible and I did some research. (Unfortunately, you cannot schedule free books, a pre-order of a book or a subscription.) But all the other books that are available for the Kindle can be purchased as a gift and scheduled. To do this, it's pretty easy.

Sign into Amazon and then find the Kindle edition of the book you want.
Click on the "Give as a Gift" button.
On the next page, put in the person's email and select the delivery date and then purchase the book. That's it. You're done.
- Or you can put in your own email address and have the ebook sent to you. You can then print the email out, wrap it up and give the ebook as a physical present to someone.

That wasn't too hard, was it? What's so great about this is that not only can you purchase the book easily while sitting and drinking some tea not having to worry about fighting traffic and the crazy mobs of people who will be out shopping the next few days, but you can also print the email out and can give the ebook as a physical gift. Just wrap the email up in a box and you're good to go.

Many, many people will be getting Kindles this holiday season and giving them an ebook as a gift can help them start their collection. For those of you new to the Kindle, one of the great features is that you don't even need a Kindle to read an ebook. If the person has a smartphone (Android device, iPhone, tablet, etc.), they simply need to download the Kindle app and they can read the ebook on that device. Or, as I like to do, I send a book to my iPhone and also have the same book on my Kindle so that I can easily go back and forth reading between the two devices.

Give the Gift of Imagination

I have loved reading since I was a little boy and thankfully my children love reading as well. With books, we can escape, learn new things, be touched and explore places we never thought possible. This holiday season when you're buying books for those on your list, please consider helping the indie authors out. There are thousands of indie authors who have put in their blood, sweat and tears to write their books and typically make them available on Amazon at cheaper prices than traditionally published writers. Just because a book is cheaper does not mean that the books are not good. Try a few out and you might be surprised.

For those interested, I have decided to give back and am offering the Kindle version of Lost: Cinderella's Secret Diary (Book 1) free from December 26 - December 28, 2013. On those days, visit Amazon and download the book for free. No strings attached. It's my way of saying thank you for all the great fans who have supported me and cheered me up this last year as I worked on the third book in the Cinderella's Secret Diaries series. Thank you.