Public Domain eBooks: Always Available

September 27, 2011

Like many of you, I have discovered the joys of eBooks. I use the Overdrive app on my Apple iPod Touch and I love it. While I still prefer actual books for most of my reading, eBooks are great for travelling. I no longer have to carry books with me when I go on Boy Scout functions, risking water damage to the books when the inevitable deluge occurs.* I also always have something on hand to read while waiting for appointments. 

There is one problem, however. The demand for Overdrive eBooks at MCPL is so high that it can often be difficult to find an eBook that is available for immediate checkout. There is an answer: Overdrive public domain eBooks. Most of the great works of literature are here, from Austen to Twain. But there's much, much more including philosophy, science, nature writing, memoirs, travel narratives, and more. Here are just a few of the public domain eBooks I've downloaded to my iPod to illustrate the wide variety available: 

• Death of a Spaceman by Walter M. Miller Jr.
• The Man Who Was Thursday, a Nightmare by G.K. Chesterson
• Relativity: the Special and General Theory by Albert Einstein
• Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Nietzsche
• Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; or, Eighteen Months in the Polar Regions in Search of Sir John Franklin's Expedition in the Years 1850-51 by Sherard Osborn

So if you've got a Nook, Kindle, Android or iOS device, or other compatible reader but you can't find anything you're interested in for immediate checkout, click here to start searching the Overdrive Public Domain eBooks. One great feature of these public domain eBooks is that the checkout never expires, so you can read them at your leisure. I know it will take me a while to get through Relativity. 

Happy hunting,

-Jeff D.
Grandview Branch

*I am currently investigating the mysterious mechanism by which concentrated Boy Scout activity attracts precipitation. My current theory is that it has something to do with S'mores, loud voices, and twine. Perhaps Einstein will cast some light on this.