Find Free Books

If you're an avid reader, chances are the words "free books" grab your attention. If you're not much of a reader, but must read a book for a class, chances are you're not interested in actually paying for a book you'll read only once. No matter how much you read, saving a few bucks (or hundreds!) is always something to be proud of. Luckily, there are a myriad of ways to obtain free books. Here I'll explore a few of these options.

First and foremost, the best way to get free books is through your local library. While this may seem obvious, libraries are often overlooked when it comes to finding a new book to read. New or popular titles may be hard to get ahold of, but with a bit of patience and your library's online hold request system, you'll be buried in a new read soon enough. In the meantime, you can browse the library stacks for a new favorite or take advantage of the many other resources a public library offers. For example, you might read the daily paper or peruse the archives of your favorite magazine. Many libraries offer classes or online access to programs to learn a new language. A lot of libraries are also building up collections of e-content, such as music, books, and programs available for the public to "check out" by downloading to their personal computers.

If you're looking for something a little closer to home, you're in luck. The internet has literally thousands of web sites to help with your literary addiction, and hundreds of them are completely free. For example, Project Gutenberg (www.gutenberg.org) has more than 27,000 completely free titles in its database. These titles are in the public domain, meaning their copyright has expired in the U.S., so they are free to use and distribute as you see fit. The Classic Bookshelf (www.classicbookshelf.com), Bibliomania (www.bibliomania.com), Bartleby (www.bartleby.com), and Fiction.us (www.fiction.us) also have hundreds of free e-books available. The complete works of William Shakespeare are available from MIT (http://shakespeare.mit.edu/).

If you're looking for textbooks or reference material, you have many good resources available as well. MIT's Open Courseware offers free university classes for the public, and supplemental materials are available on their site (http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/resources/supplemental/index.htm). FreeScience (http://www.freescience.info/index.php) offers textbooks in science and engineering. Georgia Tech hosts a page with a listing of math texts available online (http://www.math.gatech.edu/~cain/textbooks/onlinebooks.html).

One notable online book resource is DailyLit (www.dailylit.com). This site sends a book of your choice in segments to your email daily. You choose the length, time, and frequency of the emails, and you can power through the classics, modern novels (for a fee), and even Wikipedia world-tours in just a few minutes a day. DailyLit is perfect for the reader who has difficulty finding enough time in the day to read.

If audiobooks are your style, LibriVox (www.librivox.org) is worth checking out. Like Project Gutenberg, LibriVox makes titles from the public domain available. However, instead of e-books, volunteers read and record each segment of book. You can download mp3s of the entire work (if available) or individual chapters. Can't find your favorite public domain book on the site? Volunteer your own time with just a microphone and free recording software.

If you want free books but prefer the real thing instead of text on a computer screen, you're still in luck. Bookmooch (www.bookmooch.com) is a free book exchange site. People from all over the world post books they don't want anymore and mooch books they do want from other users. The system is point-based. If you send a book, you get a point, and most books in turn cost you a point to mooch. The only cost involved is shipping, but it is well worth it for quality used books.

With so many free books available, you shouldn't have any problem finding something to occupy your time. Good luck finding your new favorite book, and happy reading!