eBooks For Free: Where To Download eBooks

Since over a year ago free eBooks have been a hot topic in the publishing market. Last week, however, The Washington Post reported that Amazon has been charging users for books they could get for free on alternate sites, including Project Gutenberg.

The article stated:

The titles in question aren't just public-domain books that have long been freely available at such sites as Project Gutenberg. They appear to be the exact Gutenberg files, save only for minor formatting adjustments and the removal of that volunteer-run site's license information.

This week's announcement of the launch of Google eBooks also brings together for the first time the many outlets -- from Amazon to the indies -- when it comes to accessing books on the web.

According to the United States Copyright Department:

The public domain is not a place. A work of authorship is in the "public domain" if it is no longer under copyright protection or if it failed to meet the requirements for copyright protection. Works in the public domain may be used freely without the permission of the former copyright owner.

This leaves thousands of works available for free download online. But where are the best places to access these free texts?

Last month TechLand published a list of suggestions for free eBook downloads. The piece recommended the eReader sites themselves for downloading classics, such as downloading Fyodor Dostoyevsky on Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

For fiction other than the classics, however, the TechLand article relies heavily on Project Gutenberg:

Project Gutenberg offers thousands of downloadable free e-books in ePub (and others) format. Gutenberg is great for for exploring genres or topics with its bookshelf feature that can direct you to a list of science fiction works by title or author. (ePub files work for the Nook and the iPad, and the Kindle's .AMZ files are usually offered as well.)

A CNET article recommended the website Jungle Search, which sieves through Amazon for deals.

Beyond Project Gutenberg and bookseller websites there remain many options online. Hongkiat.com features a comprehensive list of sites that grant access to free books online.

Among these sites, Free E-Book, Many Books, and E-Book Share stand out for their accessibility and streamlined design.

Alternately, sites such as DailyLit offer access to books in innovative formats, such as serializing books to RSS Feeds or daily emails. Now Google eBooks promises to link together your personal library online so users can read seamlessly across multiple devices.

Comments

[ssrajput1985]

04:20 AM on 01/19/2011

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so ..visits the site

[Sareja]

03:21 AM on 01/18/2011

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[maatpublish]

06:46 PM on 12/30/2010

One of my favourite sites is http://www.forgottenbooks.org/ . You can subscribe or not. I chose to subscribe about a year ago. Another really good site with esoteric books online is at http://www.sacred-texts.com/. It is a little less user friendly and you may be only able to download things for a fee. But at least the titles are there and folks can get them elsewhere online if they are so inclined.

[ebookfreak]

11:55 AM on 12/21/2010

my favorite one is http://download-ebooks-free.net because they have a nice library and direct download link to PDF ebooks. also some ebook torrents. enjoy!

[AKaurora]

03:47 PM on 12/17/2010

Many people are pondering whether or not to buy an e-book reader, or to use existing software for their computers. Many claim difficulty moving over to e-books from hard copies. Consider the various options for existing free e-books and test some out. I switched over to e-books a few years ago and will never go back except when I absolutely must. Books are far harder on me physically -- both in my hands and vision. I can control my computer to give me eyeglass-free vision and the mouse is far less effort on my hands.

[Viol White]

11:48 AM on 12/13/2010

The best site I found so far for free eBooks is
http://mobibookz.co.cc/

[argus4]

12:38 AM on 12/12/2010

Many of the sites recommended here are evidently for monolingual, English-language readers. There are dozens of sites that offer at no cost French, German, Russian, south and south-east Asian language downloadable books. Some offer many genres of books for relatively small fees. If you read more than English, try using one of the search engines in the language of the book you want to read. Try searching the for book with the appropriate French, German, etc. word for "download" before the title. Some of the sites offer free or at nominal cost downloadable books in more than one language.

Now these sites are not as easy as using the OCLC world catalogue and ordering a book through Inter-Litrary Loan -- which is excellent for books that have been in print for 3-6 months (I don't remember the regulations). One caution, the University of Colorado at Boulder once lent me a book w/o informing my local library in advance that the charge was $50.00. Columbia University has charged me $10-15 dollars, which I deducted from my annual contribution with a note that as an alumnus, I felt the charge was unwarranted, given the tuition I had already paid and my record of supporting the annual campaign.

[babybecks]

08:54 PM on 12/11/2010

Isn't this basically the same story that was here 2 weeks ago?

[Scytherius]

09:44 PM on 12/12/2010

Could be but it's probably for people like me that missed it the first time. ; )

[babybecks]

12:20 AM on 12/13/2010

It was sort of about how to get around paying for the classics, while getting them for free.

[Detourz]

06:15 PM on 12/11/2010

I've loved Project Gutenberg for many years so they are my favorite source of public domain books. For current best sellers though I download most of them for free from my local public library, and put them right onto my Sony Reader. Legally.

[David Carter 29]

02:58 PM on 12/11/2010

Google books seems like a great source for free classic books, along with Gutenberg, of course. This is great site for everything related to using ebook reader software: http://ebookreadersoftware.wordpress.com

[FPhoebe]

01:13 PM on 12/11/2010

I've gotten quite a few books for my Kindle on Project Gutenberg, but I'm always hesitant to download any that were originally written in a language that was not English. There are many different publishers that you can get say, a Tolstoy book from, but you won't always get the best translation you possibly could. In that case, it's best to go to a bookstore and read a passage or two to find which book suits your needs more.

[marcdh]

09:30 PM on 12/10/2010

Eight months ago I started http://www.freeliterature.org - in support of free e-literature in general (by linking to +600 sites that matter) and PG specifically (by producing e-books, public domain and creative commons). Links are to sites that provide free e-literature from many countries and in many languages. Enjoy - and maybe consider to help out with the digitizing?

[chercheur]

08:59 PM on 12/10/2010

Strictly speak, Project Gutenberg's Kindle-compatible files are in MOBI format, not AZW. Actually, that's better, because you can manipulate MOBI files using the free MobiPocket Converter. MOBI is a proprietary Amazon format, but Mobipocket file-creation software is available for free download, so it's almost as "public domain" as ePub, though not truly so.

Gutenberg files, though, are very poorly formatted for eBook reading. There are free utilities available that will let you clean up the formatting at least to some degree, but rather than be bothered going to that effort, I'd try first to see if the book's available on Feedbooks|Mobile (http://m.feedbooks.com), which in my experience has the best formatting of any public-domain freebies.

Incidentally, for sci-fi freebies, in addition to Baen (which has already been mentioned), check out http://www.tor.com/.I'm not sure about the compatibility of Tor freebies with Kindle and other eReaders, though, or whether you've got to read them on-line at the Tor site.

[GlassMask]

02:20 PM on 12/10/2010

For those of you who like audiobooks, LibriVox.org has a few thousand public domain ones available absolutely free, with more added daily. Quality varies widely, but many are excellent. If you use the archive.org site to check them out, you even have a built in web player to sample them before downloading the whole book.

[JasonMatthews]

01:24 PM on 12/10/2010

Some authors give away free ebooks to get a readership started. Beware of this approach because once it's out it can be hard to track down from dozens of webmasters the world over. I recommend only giving a percentage of the ebook away, like 50%, with a link afterward where to buy the rest. Food for thought from an author who has tried it both ways.
http://ebooksuccess4free.webs.com