Saily Type eBooks

[MainlySteam]

I am a fan of eBooks, especially for travelling, etc and it seems that many forumites use PDA's so maybe others are fans too and can help with the following.

I know all the major sites for freeware eBooks and which have a good selection of the classics (Slocum, London, Dana, etc) but wonder if anyone knows of any sites hiding away somewhere that have a lot of marine/sailing oriented freeware eBooks for download?

Thanks for any help.

John

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[BrendanS]

Do you actually manage to read them? The idea is wonderful, and I'm the biggest gadget freak on the planet, but can't read books in anything other than real paper book format

<hr width=100% size=1>Me transmitte sursum, caledoni

 

[MainlySteam]

I prefer paper books too Brendan but alot are on ebooks that are not easily found in print unless one gets them secondhand, getting them posted, etc. Good for when travelling and for books which one might like to read once but not keep (I am not a great library goer).

I find novels and things without diagrams in no real problem - even better you can do it in the dark /forums/images/icons/smile.gif. I wonder how many kids have caught on that you don't need a torch if reading them under the bed clothes after lights out?

Strangely, I cannot bear reading them on a computer screen, but on a PDA no problem - haven't tried any of the others but find Microsoft Reader using Pocket PC ok. Many ebooks are available as text files but it is only a few seconds work converting them to Microsoft Reader using the plug in for Word.

Regards

John

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[johna]

How about a list of sites for those of us that do not know all (in my case any) of the major sites.

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[Beagle]

The American Paul Lutus has a great site. Also, the one and only sailing Ebook I know of. Can be downloaded from his site in either word (doc) or rtf format. <font color=blue><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.arachnoid.com/lutusp/sailbook.html> Confessions of a long distant sailor </A></font color=blue>

Cheers, Rene.

<hr width=100% size=1>Never under estimate the strength of human stupidity

 

[MainlySteam]

No Problem. Here are some for a start, limited to just those that have alot of freeware:

http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/ - The Online Books Page, University of Pennsylvania
http://www.mslit.com/default.asp - Microsoft Reader Catalog of Books, Microsoft
http://www.archive.org/texts/collection.php?collection=millionbooks - The Million Book Project
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.abacci.com/books/>http://www.abacci.com/books/</A> - Abbacci Books (this site links the Gutenburg collection with Amazon so descriptions, photos, that are for sale at Amazon are displayed - for the Gutenburg eBook click the blue "eText" top right hand corner).

Many of the files are text files, or in other formats eg .seb which when double clicked give a text file. If you use Microsoft Reader on a Pocket PC O/S PDA then there is a converter wordRMR.exe at www.microsoft.com (search for "wordrmr" and it currently comes up as the first two items returned) which is an add-in for Word 2002 and 2003 (there may be versions somewhere for older versions of Word). Much more pleasant than reading text files. I assume there are convertors from text to other ebook formats - maybe someone using other formats could expand on that.

For various reasons including copyright, many of the books are old, but if one enjoys the classic novels such as H.G. Wells, Verne, Dana, Dickens, Swift, Conan-Doyle, Twain, Melville, Kipling, etc, etc and books of Slocum ("Sailing Alone Around the World"), etc, etc they are all in there among piles of other stuff including Shakespeare, references, etc.

John


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[MainlySteam]

Thanks Rene. Is now downloaded and converted to Microsoft Reader format - I will give it a go.

John

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[johna]

Thank you for the comprehensive reply I shall spend some time checking out the links.

john

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[AndrewB]

As well as regular books, generally those that are older and out of copyright, there are any number of more recent cruising accounts and logs which have virtually reached the status of books. Lists of recommended ones are at:

http://www.geocities.com/TheTropics/5471/webpg.htm

These lists include ones by ex-regulars of this forum!

 

[BrendanS]

How I would have killed for this option when a kid - I was an avid nocturnal reader

<hr width=100% size=1>Me transmitte sursum, caledoni

 

[ongolo]

Dont know about sailing books, but on the GUTENBERG PROJECT you will find most classics. It is a volunteer effort and eventually almost all known books will be stored there. So I believe.

regards ongolo

<hr width=100% size=1>So what......... it floats