OK, I promise this blog won’t become all Kindle all the time…well in a few weeks. 🙂

If you are coming to this post first, make sure you check out my Reasons To Buy A Kindle post as well.

I got a comment on my Kindle book list post about wether all the top 25 fiction hardbacks were available.

A quick check showed that 14 of the top 15 were. According to the Kindle page “The Kindle Store offers 102 of 111 books currently found on the New York Times® Best Seller list. New York Times Best Sellers and most new releases are $9.99, and you’ll find many books for less.”

But I noticed something else.

A kindle could pay for itself if you read a lot of hard covers.

It appears that on average you save about $7 per book over new hard cover. (That’s off Amazon’s price, not actual retail). That means you’d pay back the Kindle after 51 books.

If you were reading all the NYT best sellers as soon as they come out, you’d make it back in months. If you read 3 a month it would take about a year and a half.

If you are a science fiction and fantasy reader like me, you can save more buying from Baen.

Personally I’m not getting a Kindle 2 because I want to save money, but if you think about it does save you money on book purchases.