UK Book Club discussion

In another topic we were talking about e-books and free e-books so I thought I'd start this topic for people to give links to free e-book sites they like, and even suggest e-books that have been good to read, as as Lynne said, some of them are quite old and obscure!

manybooks.net is where I get free ones from. You just follow the instructions and download straight to your e reader if its in the list to the right of the book you choose. The site now automatically sets it to my sony reader now. In return I donate some time to proofread books they want to convert to ebooks and it tells you all about that in 'donations' section.

Books I have downloaded and enjoyed are so far:

Agnes Grey by Ann Bronte
The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
The Ladies Delight by Anon - erotica
The House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck
39 Steps by John Buchan

Can you download to your computer from manybooks.net?

Yes you can do that too! Follow instructions on the site.

Cool, I'll check it out! Thanks! :D

I recommend anything by Saki, the Sherlock Holmes canon, the first few Father Brown books, the Arsene Lupin books by Maurice Leblanc, Ernest Bramah's Max Carrados books, and the first Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles.

These are all available from Project Gutenberg, http://www.gutenberg.org/

Hope you enjoy them! I'd appreciate any other recommendations of books too.

It's worth pointing out that there are different Project Gutenbergs for different countries that often have different content, especially where countries have different copyright rules. Worth checking out, as long as the files are out of copyright in your country, of course.

The other day whilst browsing the Android marketplace I found an app called Aldiko, which is a free ebook reader. I would definitely recommend it if anyone here has an Android phone!

I get mine from http://www.feedbooks.com/
I don't have an electronic reader so I just download the PDF file and read it on my PC.
Thing is I'm going to end up with more ebooks than I can ever read!

Thanks Kathryn, this a great site!

I really like Mobipocket Reader as a free ebook reader.

Has anyone got the International Kindle and have they compared it with the latest Sony or other Ereaders? As the Kindle is supported by Amazon I assume that it will have the possibility of uploading the greatest number of ebooks, including recent publications, and not be limited to classics and less popular books?

Don't know if anyone has noticed but you can download e-books from GR itself as pdf files, just go to the explore books section then click on e-books and away you go. If you click on the more ebooks link at the bottom of the page it gives you the full list of available ebooks :-)

Yeah, I saw that the other day but didn't get a chance to have a look at what was available!

It looks like quite a good selection, I've only had a quick browse through but there's a few there that I want to read (might have to print them off though, not a huge fan of reading from computer screens)

Yeah, I'm the same - I don't mind reading on my phone if it's the only way I can carry a book round with me, but I prefer to read them on paper.

Hi,
Paul Rix here, there is a new 'E' reader just being released it is called 'QUE' from what I have heard about it, it is two or three generations ahead of anything else. It is one third of an inch thick, flexible, can be dropped, has touch screen technology and a host of other functions. I have got all the 'speil' about it on it's way. It is supposed to be much easier to read and to locate what you are looking for than any of the others, and on top of all that a memory which puts most desk top computers to shame. Check out the 'plastic logic' web site. As soon as I have more info. I'll let you know.
All the best, Paul Rix [oldgeezer:]

If you're going to print them off, unless they're hugely obscure you're probably better to go to the library or buy a cheap copy (out of copyright classics can usually be bought very cheaply in places like The Works or Amazon Marketplace) for the cost of paper, ink, and wear & tear on your printer plus the hassle of reading the pages (not easy to flip etc).

Rose wrote: "If you're going to print them off, unless they're hugely obscure you're probably better to go to the library or buy a cheap copy (out of copyright classics can usually be bought very cheaply in pla..."

This is true if I was going to use my own printer, but I'll probably print the shorter ones off in work and just read the longer ones on screen (unless I get really annoyed by it then I mite print them as well). It helps that the printers can also print in booklet format so it saves a lot of paper and makes it more readable :-)

I have a Sony PRS-500 and love it, looked at the Kindle but I know people that have it and have moved back to Sony, it isn't geared for the UK (is even supplied with a US charger so you have to pay £30 extra for the UK one). I got a load of free books from the sony site but haven't found many others yet so going to try a few mentioned on here.

Kimberley wrote: "I have a Sony PRS-500 and love it, looked at the Kindle but I know people that have it and have moved back to Sony, it isn't geared for the UK (is even supplied with a US charger so you have to pay..."

Hi kim
here is a free Ebook site www.manybooks.net a friend of mine uses it quite a bit. I havent got a ereader yet I have downloaded some books from it all ready and I found it quite easy to do.

Just noticed that bookdepository.co.uk has free ebooks. Haven't downloaded any yet but I might do later.

Will have to check them out when I get home, Thanks Nick and Kathryn.

Does anyone have recommendations for books they have enjoyed available as free e-books?

Beyond the ones I listed above, I have listened to a lot as public domain audiobooks from Librivox.

www.archive.org also has lots of books although most are actual scans, not converted text, so they can be a bit harder to read and need more disk space etc.

Not got any for e-book but recommend Mike Bennett and J.C. Hutchins for audio books, both are available on iTunes and Podiobooks and are incredably addictive.

Kimberley wrote: "I have a Sony PRS-500 and love it, looked at the Kindle but I know people that have it and have moved back to Sony, it isn't geared for the UK (is even supplied with a US charger so you have to pay..."

I too have this one and the new touch - great aren't they. I use manybooks.net a lot and as a thank you to them I do a bit of proofreading for them to get more books available.

I second Kathryn's suggestion of Feedbooks which is a great resource for free classics as well as contemporary "indie" fiction. Most books are provided in the major formats too (.pdf .epub etc). Quality can be varied so it's sometimes a bit hit-or-miss but there are definitely some great finds to be had.

Personal favourites of mine so far have been:
Belly Button Reset by Joshua Hale Fialkov,
His Robot Girlfriend by Wesley Allison and
Tokyo Zero by Marc Horne

Some Librivox books are better than others - some are really good (the guy who does "The mysterious affair at Styles" is fab). Often a different person reads each chapter so even if one person is dire the next may be okay. I have read a couple of bits for them myself.

Have to say that since finding a good torrent site for audiobooks I rarely use LV, though. Only for ones I can't get hold of a commercial copy of.

If you go through the Project Gutenburg site, they have some human-read professional ones (notably the Sherlock Holmes series, which you have to pay for if you go to the producer's site).

Finally figured out how to get ebooks on my mobile, but it's such a tiny screen it's hardly worth it. Would love one that was better for reading ebooks on. Far less geeky-looking to stand there fiddling with a mobile in queues etc :-)