There is a lot of talk going on these days about e-books, and what they mean to a book's future, or to the future of books in general. Most traditional publishers have a small e-book department that decides whether or not to release a title in electronic format also, usually after it has been released in a print version. As a result, many thousands of books are now available as an e-book.

Do they actually sell? No, they don't, not by the thousands, and generally not even by the hundreds. People don't like reading e-books the same way they like reading printed books, and it is obvious why. Most folks don't enjoy staring at their home computer screen for hours on end. And if they possess a hand-held reader, they're not that keen either, despite the mobility of those gadgets. They are small, not easy to read and, more importantly, they require totally new reading habits.

And that's key. We are simply not used to reading books in any other way than from old-fashioned paper. We all grew up with using a book product that has basically remained unchanged ever since book publishing came to America in 1639. And something that took almost four centuries of habit forming is not likely to change overnight.

Remember the paperless society that was going to break out once everyone had access to a computer? Quite the opposite has happened. According to the American Forrest and Paper Organization, paper consumption rose during the very years that America's homes and offices were stacked with computers and other electronic simplifiers of life, between 1990 and 1998, from 80 million tons to 92 million tons, and we're still counting. We each use 730 pounds of paper per year, or two pounds per day.

This is not to say that there will never be a generation that reads most of its books electronically. In fact, it is highly likely that one day that will be the case. But not tomorrow, not in the near future. And until then, the printed book will remain the main carrier of story telling.

That is why e-book publishing has still not become a booming business. Author Stephen King pioneered the technology by selfpublishing his "Riding the Bullet"in e-format a few years ago, and sold a few hundred thousand copies, but this has remained an isolated incident, and not a very indicative one. After all, there is only one Stephen King and, moreover, the "book" counted no more than 66 pages. The average fiction book counts 225 pages.

So what to look for when you have written a book and you are ready to see it published? Thousands of new authors, in the mistaken belief that they would never find a traditional publisher who would take a chance on their work, signed their rights away to one of those fledgling e-publishers, hoping for exposure, and usually after paying a fee. With very few exceptions, they are all disappointed. Despite the low retail price of their e-book, typically under $10, they have sold no more than a small handful of copies.

Therefore, that is not the road to go. It is no one's dream to write a book and only see it published on the internet. Those who dream about being published, dream about a real book, a tangible product of sheets of paper bound together between a front and a back cover. Even the staunchest tree huggers who want to write a book, for example about protecting the environment, would prefer to see it in print. Why? Because that's what being published is all about, plus they know that a printed book reaches a much larger audience, and finally, it does not hurt to know that presently more than 50 percent of all books are printed on recycled paper, and that this percentage is growing every year.

So here is what to aim for. Get your book published by a traditional publisher. Don't pay anyone anything in order to be published. Focus on the print version. Don't push for a simultaneous release as an e-book. Get the print sales underway first. If your publisher is smart, he will wait at least six to twelve months before he considers to also release your book in e-format, much like they used to release paperbacks after hardcover sales had run their initial course. They don't do that anymore, unless the author is a celebrity. Trade paperbacks have replaced the vast majority of first hardcover editions, and e-book releases are now replacing what used to be the cheap paperback edition.

Either way, do not count on your e-book making any big sales. It's just not happening. Not yet.