As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.
I hestitate at times to share websites which I employ at times, as the last thing I need in not having money is someone shutting down sites which provide free things. I am though going to share something here, as I mentioned it in someone asking me what would be a good source of Joan of Arc books.
The Gutenberg Project is a southern based website which features thousands of volumes of manuscripts which are free, and in most cases, they are well assembled in mobi form for Kindle, and other text or epub formats.
Amazon refuses to give away books now in hiding them, and for me, their books are worthless as to content, but Gutenberg I have downloaded everything from Alice in Wonderland to Livestock books to bird books. I will add that the recent uploads are very nice in having book covers and in the bird books, color photos of birds.
http://www.gutenberg.org
Most of these books are proof read and a delight, with the disclaimers in the back. The titles are old and international, but all copyright expired. That is exactly what I desire in books, as modern propaganda is horrid thing.
These books make good homeschooling material also in McGuffey's readers, are listed there in all 6 volumes.
I will add one more site in this for the reason Google Books is like Amazon in teasing with titles, but you can only read online. What bothered me were the titles of Admiral David Dixon Porter, an American Hero, and Google only has these online, while Archive dot org, has these books and others from university libraries, which I have added to my ebook file.
I am currently reading Following the Guidon by Elizabeth Custer, which on Amazon is one of the more expensive titles in her works, which of course she gets nothing from.
This book is not proof read, so it has mistakes in it, but it is readable, along with some nice wood etchings which I have never seen previously.
http://www.archive.org
The point in the above two links are they are free, in meaning, they are free, without registering, some installation software to spy on you, or other nonsense. You should be able to search for a book, and then just click on it and add it to your files.
The only "problem" I have with Gutenberg is the files go into downloads, and are all numbered, instead of titles, so when you have some horder like myself, I have so many that I have to open the files, then rename, and then find them in the Kindle folder and rename them again after opening them, in the advent I flashdrive save them, and want to know what I have in the library.
Some titles like my favorite in having only read one of his books, Robert Heinlein, are not available in complete form online in Kindle. I have Starman Jones in text and audio, but I would like not have to build it on Mobi to have that book. It would probably be the only group of books I would ever spend money on now, but will keep looking for my obscure titles as perhaps some of them will show up.
I used to invest 100 dollars per year in used books, from Amazon to Ebay, but I can not afford that. I never thought that I would like ebooks, as I had text files which opened and I did not like the intimacy as it was hard to read.
Kindle though in library download is a format on my old used laptop which I enjoy. Kindle though is like Microsoft in self destructing which is infuriating. The one I had lasted 18 months and then "expired" in the free addition, so I suppose it was about spying on me and I had to download again as the updates refused to work.
You need highspeed net for this, and it still is too large a data file. The problem is a caveat in this, as I was in Starbucks sitting, with a group of pretentious odd people, as it was my first experience to be waited on dorky ugly people, surrounded by rich people in exercise clothes which have never seen sweat nor ever would, as Starbucks is about being seen and not turpentine coffee. The reason I mention this, is Starbucks internet was slow as dial up.
Libraries are still the best bet, for getting a fast download free, and also in getting your data stolen.
The long point in this is, I have several hundred books now, in which I probably could not even find the original in reprint, and this collection would be worth several thousand dollars, meaning completely out of my purse as I got 4 shirts for 5 bucks and I cringed at that, as the five was allot, but I needed them from the junk store.....one of which is the Grinch and puppy which made me laugh, even if I do not wear message t shirts.
These two sites I have had no problems with and it affords me into areas which are not available in other areas. I need to see if some programmer has created a free version of a Kindle reader which I would download in a few seconds and leave it behind like I leave all things Microsoft in the internet surf.
That is enough on this subject for now.
agtG
