Enhancing the reading experience
Reading Wolf Hall on the iPhone
Enhanced Editions on taking Wolf Hall to the iPhone.
As a huge fan of Hilary Mantel's previous books (especially Beyond Black), Enhanced Editions couldn't have been more delighted when we were approached by HarperCollins to talk about bringing Wolf Hall to the iPhone. This is a title that has both captured the imagination of thousands of readers and which defies simple categorisation. The idea of bringing it to an even wider audience through the iPhone appealed massively.
Many people's first reaction to reading on an iPhone is that "it will give me eyeache". But in reality that's far from true: mobile reading is both extremely popular and a joy: we've spent a lot of time making sure that our app for Wolf Hall is a delight to read.
In fact, digital books have many benefits over their print counterparts, beyond the environmental. As well as weighing exactly nothing, our app for Wolf Hall allows you to change the font size, read entire chapters without having to turn the page (instead using a nifty, gravity-inspired tilt scroll function) and switch to a low-power, partner-friendly "night mode" where the text becomes white on a black background. If you want to read in landscape mode, you may notice that the width of the iPhone screen isn't that shy of that of a paperback.
When we set up Enhanced Editions in 2008, it was because we found ourselves using our iPhones to read more - not less - than before, and we thought there were millions of people like us. Even as career-long publishers, occasional reading suddenly became so much easier: on the bus, waiting for the tube, opening an app that remembers the exact place you left it for a quick literary fix becomes second nature very quickly. Longer-lasting reading sessions also have their rewards: we recently found out that many people use our reading apps for over two hours at a time. (And as an insomniac, I find myself reading my iPhone in bed at all hours, without the need for a light.)
Given our background in books, design and publishing we knew that bringing books to a device that, as someone much smarter than me said, "has eyes, ears, a mouth, knows where it is and which way up it is pointing", would be about subtlety and lightness of touch rather than flashy, interruptive features. You don't notice a book "interface" - it's just printed words on paper. So we knew it had to be the same with our app: we have adhered to all of the best principles of typography and white space in our design.
The iPhone of course allows us to add to the text in appropriate ways, ways which we have worked with 4th Estate to make sure "Enhance" the reading experience. Wolf Hall the app then contains the full text, plus video of Hilary in discussion with David Starkey at the Tower of London, a collection of interviews and background information about how the book came to be written, and a newsfeed.
The newsfeed is an interesting option for readers. Updated at any given point, it allows us to offer new pieces of writing, further content (such as a podcast or film interview from YouTube), competitions or reviews and criticism of the book. We have found that readers absolutely love the newsfeed and enjoy the exclusive relationship it builds between publisher, author and reader.
The app also contains some great supporting material to the book: family trees and a list of characters; an introductory chapter, "The Novelist's Arithmetic", by Hilary, explaining the genesis of the book; an interview with HIlary about her writing processes; and a timeline of key dates.
If you have an iPhone, iPod Touch or even (if you are very lucky) an iPad, do have a go with our app, and let us know what you think.
There is a free one-chapter "sampler" of the app, if you want to try before you buy or you can get the full app, with videos and all the extras.
Peter Collingridge is Co-Founder at Enhanced Editions.
