Any thoughts?

Can anyone tell me where and how I can take pictures of my books that has a white background, is either outside or in a window, is in a "context that make sense", has something interesting behind it, has something personal about it, shows the entire book, is zoomed in on detail, and is the same for each book so that people can recognize my work from the picture; all for the first picture of each listing?

That's what I need to do to incorporate all the tips I've been given for my photography. Now, I know my photos still need work, but just who's advice should I follow? I find it fascinating to look at the shops of people who give me tips, and about half the time I find that the people who told me, my pictures stink, need a lot of work on their own pictures. (Of course, I've told other people they need work on their pictures, but I always started by saying I knew my own weren't perfect. That makes everything OK, doesn't it?)

My own inclination is to ignore everyone (personally, my favorite way of handling conflicting advise). Instead, I'm going to try to copy one of my customers techniques, (who is a photographer, by the way) who never made any derogatory comments on my pictures, even though she actually knew how to take better pictures, because I love these photos: Rachael's blog.

But of course, these are large photos. I need to be able to capture someones attention in a 1"x1" square, out of 3,000 other 1"x"1 squares. $55-$150 worth of attention.

I also need a good camera to work with. Mine's broken, so I have to use Mom's lousy one.. Actually, she has a very good camera, that was very expensive when it first came out. But, a very good, complicated camera becomes a very bad, very useless camera in the hands of a user who won't take the time to read the manual to figure out how it works. I have so far discovered (by randomly trying buttons, {the same way I play video games} )that the only way to get a clear picture of white pages with writing on them in in-direct lighting is to put it on the movie setting. (Why does it take pictures on the movie setting? Haven't the slightest idea.)

After reading this post, one would probably get the impression that I'm electronically challenged. Let me enlighten you, if that is your belief. I can learn anything (within reason, I'm no "geek") if I have someone show me, or if I care enough to spend hours and hours on end figuring it out on my own. I also love on-line tutorials (how I figured out how to post links on this blog when the "cheat" link button isn't working, and how to apply the background, and what-not), and look for them whenever possible. Then you don't have to expose your ignorance to anyone.

As Stymie said: "Uh,uh. I won't show my ig-nor-ance to noooo-body!"