onsdag den 5. januar 2011

E-Book Resources

You probably remember that I bought a Kindle e-reader in November. I do enjoy my gadget, but I still read more printed books. I read 8-10 crime novels per month, and my principle is that I go for the cheapest possible copy. I understand if some writers grit their teeth when they hear about all the used books I buy, but then professional reviewers get all their review copies for free.

I know I am not the only e-book reader who is looking for new ways to get around the fact that some  e-books are more expensive than the paperback (typically $ 10-13 for Danish customers), and no matter what the retailers say, that is not a reasonable price. [Customers outside UK cannot buy e-books from e.g. Amazon UK or Waterstones]

So far I have found Smashwords, a wonderful site where many writers upload their older works at extremely fair prices.

If you are looking for free classics, ManyBooks.Net is the place to go, and if you are interested in review copies directly from the publishers, you may join NetGalley.

Where do you get your e-books? 
Have you found resources you will share with me and my readers? 


Readers´ resources: 
Book Depository (NB: they do not ship to Denmark) 
.

13 kommentarer:

Bernadette sagde ...

Try ebooks.com http://www.ebooks.com/ - not every book is available outside the US but I just took a look and it seems to have improved in the past couple of months - when I first went there I couldn't find any books to buy for Australia - now there are a few at least (a Mankell for example). new releases are hard to get for outside the US though

Read Without Paper has OK prices on backlist items, lousy prices on new releases
http://www.readwithoutpaper.com/

Book Depository has OK pricing but lots of times their titles are out of stock (worth a try though) (not sure why they still let you buy when no other UK store will but as of 2 weeks ago they were still allowing non UKites to buy from them)

Bernadette sagde ...

Forgot to say that with eBooks there are a variety of formats on sale so you might need to use a conversion software - Calibre is excellent for this purpose

Bibliophile sagde ...

My favourite e-book source is without doubt http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page. Of course it's only copyright free books, but there are so many of them, and many (if not all - I haven't checked) are available in several forms, including Kindle. There are even some audio books.

Anonym sagde ...

Dorte - Smashwords really is an excellent site; I'm glad you mentioned it! I haven't got an E-reader, so I can't offer any wisdom about where to get good E-books at good prices.... :-(

Anonym sagde ...

Amazon would not like to charge so much for e-books. When Kindle was first launched, most ebooks were very cheap. Then the publishers ganged up on Amazon and enforced the model by which they (the publisher) sets the price. Amazon dropped those publishers from their listings at first, but eventually all the major publishers joined up so Amazon has little choice.
What Amazon (UK) now does is to run two e-book listings in columns on the page - one column for "paid" and another for "free". When you go to the kindle listing for a "paid" book, Amazon adds a note to say whether the publisher has set the price or not (if it has, you can bet the book is about twice the price that Amazon charges for books where it (Amazon) has set the price).
Also, in the UK, e-books are subject to VAT, now 20 per cent, which is not the case for printed books. Someone (seller or buyer) has to absorb this extra cost, therefore.


I do like your post and it is nice that cheap versions of e-books are available, but I do think that Amazon would love to sell e-books more cheaply if it could!

Dorte H sagde ...

Thank you for your suggestions & your input.

Maxine: you are probably right that I was unfair. And I know that ´my´ Amazon price must be due to the Danish VAT so I could just emigrate to a country with sensible book prices. I have changed my post a bit.

Belle Wong sagde ...

These are great resources. I mostly get my ebooks from Amazon, Barnes and Noble (their NookKids picture books mainly), Fictionwise and KoboBooks. I've also purchased from the Sony ebook store. Project Gutenberg given me almost a full library of LM Montgomery's works.

Kelly sagde ...

As you know, I just got my Kindle so this is all new to me. However, I've already learned that it's often cheaper to get the paperback rather than the Kindle edition, especially in books that aren't new releases. As for real books, I would buy far more used books if I had more places that sold them in my area. Unfortunately the places we do have rarely have the authors or titles I'm looking for. (Donna Leon, for example. My only used copies of her books I found out of town)

Unknown sagde ...

This is really cool! I know you can get most of what's on Project Gutenberg for free on Amazon.com for free as well.

CD

Beth F sagde ...

I don't buy enough eBooks to have any resources at all. I just buy from Barnes & Nobel and the Sony store. My library has eBooks for downloading and so does NetGalley.

Dorte H sagde ...

Thank you for your tips and suggestions!

Harvee sagde ...

I also found out about http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page and ManyBooks.net for free eBooks.

Many classics I have downloaded for free from Amazon or for less than $3.

Lauren sagde ...

I would love to get an e-reader, but I can't get enough of what I want to read to make it wortwhile. The non-English/outside UK/US market is really underserved at the moment!