For those unaware, they take public domain books and create really high quality, free versions that can be read on any ereader or online. Every book also has an oil painting that is also public domain chosen to be its cover.
I have discovered a lot of amazing lesser known literature over the years from here, and wanted to suggest it in case anyone had not heard of it. The people running it do amazing work and there seems to be a steady stream of three or four new releases almost weekly.
the Libby app, available from many public libraries in the USA is also a good source of of audiobooks & ebooks
Definitely! Obviously, one big drawback of Standard Ebooks is public domain books are all quite old. I find it a nice supplement when I am backed up on a waitlist at the library.
Borrowbox in the UK, Onleihe in Germany.
Libby also works in Canada.
Check also Hoopla and Cloudlibrary. Between those three, I get most of what I’m looking for from my public libraries.
Same in New Zealand. And it has audiobooks as well as eBooks.
Yes, I used it to get into audio books and it genuinely changed my life!
Overdrive app similary in Australia for library borrowing on my Kobo.
I also use the physical libray as my only source of dead tree books. I live in a small rural village with a tiny library, so i like to supoort it in the hope it stays open.
The eponoymous Project Gutenberg as well
Thanks for sharing!
However, my favorite place for books is still the local library.
Thanks. It has previously occurred to me that Amazon Kindle deliberately made their Project Gutenberg content deliberately
shit(edit) badly implemented so that they could say they had a ton of free ebooks while still steering users towards paying for them anyway.? I’ve never had any trouble with the gutenberg stuff, but i’m not big into ereaders. i mostly just read it on my phone tho. what’s shit about it?
I’m referring specifically to Amazon Kindle’s implementation.
gotcha. thanks for clarifying.
Anyone have some favorites available here? Been getting back into reading and looking for some recommendations that aren’t the same top 100 books of all time lists that are all over the internet. Many of those books killed my interest in reading for a bit…
Luckily they list estimate read times at the top of the book pages, so you can dive into some short reads to get a feel for authors and content.
I read mostly non-fiction, but if you’re down for sci-fi:
H G Wells Invisible Man is a short favorite of mine.
And Edgar Rice Burroughs has a bunch of fun shorter stories, many are part of a Martian Series, which the movie John Carter was based on (one of my and my SOs fav comfort movies).
Which genres do you most enjoy?
Don’t know what you enjoy but I’ve been working my way through Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children series and find it to be a very nice escape. Fantasy novellas.
I think @rescue_toaster@lemmy.zip meant books available within Standard Ebooks, which does not have those Seanan McGuire books. But I wanted to link their fantasy books here in case you wanted to check out some public domain classics:
https://standardebooks.org/subjects/fantasy
Giving a quick perusal, maybe one of these would appeal since you enjoyed McGuire’s books:
Lilith by George MacDonald
The Wood Beyond the World by William Morris
The King of Elfland’s Daughter by Lord Dunsany
If you follow those links, there is a nice short description of each along with a touch of historic context.
Oh you’re totally right, thank you, I forgot where I was when I replied hahaha. Thanks for the recs though, I’ll have a look!
EEEEE they have the pg wodehouse novels EEEEEEE
Wow, they have a ton of Wodehouse. Any suggestions where to start?
first page 1, then go on to page 2?
they all have the same plot. you don’t read wodehouse for plot, you read it to see how he turns a phrase and how reginald is going to get bertram out of marrying the latest heiress this week. it is the best pulp.
if you need to dip your toe first, watch an episode or two of the
BBCITV comedy starring hugh laurie and stephen fry, “Jeeves and Wooster”. they are perfectly cast.ITV not BBC. The BBC series ran in the 60s and was almost entirely wiped.
ah, thanks for the clarification. i’m running off info my friend who introduced it to me (she gave me a thumb with the ripped dvds on it) and i haven’t bothered to check all these years i guess. now i can be right!
Unfortunately they “modernise” the text so the full effect of Wodehouse is lost.
does the gutenberg do that too? i might cry. what pink fellow would do that. i’ve got my old hardcover at least.No, its something standard ebooks does. Gutenberg keeps the text as it was in the source edition, except obvious errors.
More power to the folks on their kindles or whatev but Grandpa Stern grew up on paperbacks and he intends to pass his unwieldy large pile of goofy ass books to the kiddos.
