Free Books Jan 2009--Post info about Free Books Here!

[Betsy the Quilter]

This is the new thread for Free Books;  a new thread will be created each month and stickied, older threads will be locked and unstickied but will still be available for reference.  Members should be aware, however, that Free books on Amazon do not always remain free and should check prices before 1-clicking!

Betsy

[GoldenDogMom]

I was so excited to find a beautifully formatted Kindle-friendly version of the Chinese classic "Journey to the West" on a site called "Spontaneous Derivation"
http://www.spontaneousderivation.com/2008/12/27/new-on-kindle-december-21st-26th/. (Sorry - I don't know how to do the paste-in a cover thing, but it has a beautiful cover)

It tells the story of the "Monkey King", a Chinese folk hero whose adventures are as familiar to Chinese children as the Three Bears (OK, can you tell I don't have kids ) are to us. A recent Jet Li/Jackie Chan movie "The Forbidden Kingdom" tells part of the story too.

Don't be put off by its length - it makes great bedtime reading, one chapter per night.

Disclaimer:
(I am new to all of this, so if for some reason this is an "illegal" eBook, please excuse me)

[Betsy the Quilter]

GoldenDogMom--

Thanks for the link, I looked at it and it looks like a valid free book, so you're OK.  Good blog to know about, too, I don't know whether it's in our list of Blogs that Verena (pidgeon92) keeps, but I'll check!

Betsy

[chynared21]

I was so excited to find a beautifully formatted Kindle-friendly version of the Chinese classic "Journey to the West" on a site called "Spontaneous Derivation"
http://www.spontaneousderivation.com/2008/12/27/new-on-kindle-december-21st-26th/. (Sorry - I don't know how to do the paste-in a cover thing, but it has a beautiful cover)

It tells the story of the "Monkey King", a Chinese folk hero whose adventures are as familiar to Chinese children as the Three Bears (OK, can you tell I don't have kids ) are to us. A recent Jet Li/Jackie Chan movie "The Forbidden Kingdom" tells part of the story too.

Don't be put off by its length - it makes great bedtime reading, one chapter per night.

Disclaimer:
(I am new to all of this, so if for some reason this is an "illegal" eBook, please excuse me)

Hi and welcome GDM...nice to have you here.

Oh...memories of the Monkey King. I remember a show we did in grade school and it was The Monkey King. Thanks for putting a smile on my face.

As far as copywrite goes...this folk tale was written so long ago...

[pidgeon92]

Thanks for the link, I looked at it and it looks like a valid free book, so you're OK.  Good blog to know about, too, I don't know whether it's in our list of Blogs that Verena (pidgeon92) keeps, but I'll check!

I shall add it to the list.... Thanks!

[Arachne Jericho]

Hello all,

I'm extremely new to the boards (and left a hello message in the Introductions forum).  I'm the owner of the website that offers Journey to the West (and some others), and I'm very happy to see that others have found the book. 

As for copyright, while the original Chinese is definitely no longer under copyright, language translations are possibly under copyright.  The translation used in the free ebook is one of the few older translations that preserve the verse separate from the prose (instead of smushing everything into text), and even that was offered up by Silk Pagoda in HTML form under a Creative Commons License (2.5, attribute-noncommercial-remix allowed), albeit for free.  I reformatted the text, did up a page of contents, and created a Kindle/Mobipocket version and an Epub version for the Sony Reader, and also released the result under the same license, for free.

The cover is one of the few illustrations from the Monkey King and is also public domain.  This is a colored version I found on a .edu site a while back.   Here it is (image links to flickr page):



Copyright is a walking landmine these days, and since I create ebooks for people to download for free, I've read over copyright law and err only on the side of safety.   In fact, I wrote up a little list of steps to go through to check if something is under United States copyright, which is what applies to the files on my site, since they're stored on a U.S. server.

Interested folk can find a few more free books on my blog's Downloads page.  I added the United States Constitution in December '08, and it's my most recent "proud-of" work. 

There is one curiosity on the Downloads page.  Only one fully copyright and non-creative-commons-remixable-license work exists there---Julian: A Christmas Story---which is there only after a discussion with the author for permission, once he viewed the work in progress and okay'ed it and all that.  It was a finalist in the 2007 Hugo Awards for best novella.  Probably that's the only time I'll ever be able to put up a copyrighted work.   I tread the line very carefully and as respectfully as possible.

[chynared21]

Hello all,

I'm extremely new to the boards (and left a hello message in the Introductions forum).  I'm the owner of the website that offers Journey to the West (and some others), and I'm very happy to see that others have found the book. 

As for copyright, while the original Chinese is definitely no longer under copyright, language translations are possibly under copyright.  The translation used in the free ebook is one of the few older translations that preserve the verse separate from the prose (instead of smushing everything into text), and even that was offered up by Silk Pagoda in HTML form under a Creative Commons License (2.5, attribute-noncommercial-remix allowed), albeit for free.  I reformatted the text, did up a page of contents, and created a Kindle/Mobipocket version and an Epub version for the Sony Reader, and also released the result under the same license, for free.

The cover is one of the few illustrations from the Monkey King and is also public domain.  This is a colored version I found on a .edu site a while back.   Here it is (image links to flickr page):



Copyright is a walking landmine these days, and since I create ebooks for people to download for free, I've read over copyright law and err only on the side of safety.   In fact, I wrote up a little list of steps to go through to check if something is under United States copyright, which is what applies to the files on my site, since they're stored on a U.S. server.

Interested folk can find a few more free books on my blog's Downloads page.  I added the United States Constitution in December '08, and it's my most recent "proud-of" work. 

There is one curiosity on the Downloads page.  Only one fully copyright and non-creative-commons-remixable-license work exists there---Julian: A Christmas Story---which is there only after a discussion with the author for permission, once he viewed the work in progress and okay'ed it and all that.  It was a finalist in the 2007 Hugo Awards for best novella.  Probably that's the only time I'll ever be able to put up a copyrighted work.   I tread the line very carefully and as respectfully as possible.

Hi and welcome again.

Thanks for taking the time and reformatting this story. I look forward to reading it. Also, thanks for the explanations.

[Dori]

Welcome and thank you!   I have always loved The Velveteen Rabbit and have given it to many kids.  I just downloaded it and my 8 yr. old gr8 nephew will be surprised to find it on my Kindle.    Yes I do let him use KINDLEABRA when he is visiting me and he has some books on it.

[Arachne Jericho]

Welcome and thank you!   I have always loved The Velveteen Rabbit and have given it to many kids.  I just downloaded it and my 8 yr. old gr8 nephew will be surprised to find it on my Kindle.    Yes I do let him use KINDLEABRA when he is visiting me and he has some books on it.

I love that story so much also; finding a version online with graphics, and all in the public domain, was just irresistible.  One thing I've been doing on the Kindle is buying up childhood classics to read over---young and older. 

I'm still waiting for Watership Down....

[Betsy the Quilter]

Arachne Jericho,

welcome to Kindleboards, and thanks for posting about the book.  I saw that it was published under a Creative Commons license--glad to hear the full explanation from you.  Love your blog/website, it's a great resource for Kindlers.

I read in another post that you've already found our t-shirts.  One-click is indeed dangerous!  We've also got Book Klubs starting this week in the Book Corner!  And I believe Verena has added your blog to our list of Kindle blogs!

Welcome again!

Betsy

[CS]

I'm extremely new to the boards (and left a hello message in the Introductions forum).  I'm the owner of the website that offers Journey to the West (and some others), and I'm very happy to see that others have found the book. 

Thanks for putting this up. I was intrigued by the story of the Monkey King from the bits they used in The Forbidden Kingdom with Jackie Chan and Jet Li. I'm going to check out your site now to see what else you have. Welcome to Kindleboards!

[Dori]

I have the Aesop Fables and Andersen Fairy Tales on Kindleabra for the 8 yr old also and many of the Dickens and others.

[ljloula]

I too was thrilled to see Velveteen Rabbit there! I don't know what happened to my DTB ....and I had it on audio at one point as well.

[jmiked]

Here's a great free book at Manybooks....

The Curse of Capistrano by Johnston McCulley.

Published in 1919, the is the book that introduced Zorro to the world.

Mike

[LDB]

I don't mind paying a little bit if a little bit of that goes to help the board. For anyone else who wants to do that and thereby make a small donation to the board here's the link.

[Lizzy]

Here is a free book. Its not Amazon so you have to click on the url not the picture. There is alot of different formats to choose from.

http://www.snowbooks.com/RobertFinn/



Being a thief makes it difficult to meet the right girl. And when you do, something always gets in the way. Like finding yourself trapped underground, caught in a shoot-out, with the police after you and only a supernatural killer to protect you. And if you somehow survive all that, you’ve still got to persuade her to part with her phone number. Underlife is a fast, short, sweet, tense runaway train of a thriller.

[Ann in Arlington]

Re:  Underlife.  The PDF seems to be the best formatted; Windows 2003 a close second.  The RTF and txt versions don't have good paragraph delineation.  I converted it with mobicreator and sent it to Kindle.  It reads just fine though the start of the actual book is just sort of mushed into the license stuff at the beginning.  For reference, it's location 79.

Re: Capistrano.  The free one is actually formatted better than the inexpensive version on Amazon.  Free book has linked table of contents.  Amazon version does not and has space bewteen paragraphs, based on the sample.

Ann
(my opinions only, of course  - - it's all subjective.)

[sebat]

I don't mind paying a little bit if a little bit of that goes to help the board. For anyone else who wants to do that and thereby make a small donation to the board here's the link.

LDB you might want to add this to the Jan. bargain book thread. 

It looks like a pretty good book.

[sjc]

Great Idea...Betsy:  What would we do without you? 

[tc]

Right now on www.snowbooks.com these books:

   

Shattered Teacup by George Mann  and Underlife by Robert Finn are being offered free.  Shattered Teacup is only 16 pages on the pdf.

posted 1/2/09

[pidgeon92]

....

Free until ~Jan 23rd, according to her website. It is a PDF on Scribd, and you need to set up an account (no fee). 

[sebat]

....

Free until ~Jan 23rd, according to her website. It is a PDF on Scribd, and you need to set up an account (no fee). 

Amazon offered this for free a month or two ago.  It was a good read.  Not for someone with a weak stomach.

[auntmarge]

Just ran across this announcement while looking at random members' pages on LibraryThing:

Storyteller by G. R. Grove, free PDF download at  http://www.lulu.com/content/5479719 until Feb. 15, 2009

The author says the following on his LT page (http://www.librarything.com/profile/gwernin):

I'll be doing an author chat on LibraryThing between Jan. 26 and Feb. 9. The e-book version of Storyteller, the first book in my series, is available as a free download between now and Feb. 15.

THE STORYTELLER SERIES SO FAR:

What: Two historical novels - Storyteller and Flight of the Hawk. A third one - The Ash Spear - is scheduled for publication this summer, completing the first trilogy in what I hope will be a nine-book series.


When & Where: 6th century Britain, a generation after King Arthur.

Who: A young man called Gwernin (it's a long story...) who wants to become a bard. He begins as a traveling storyteller, and ends as - but I'll let him tell you that himself. Along the way we hear some of the stories he tells and experiences, in a time and place where real world and otherworld are not that far apart.

Why: Because I've always had a strong interest in Dark Ages Britain, ever since I read Rosemary Sutcliff's The Lantern Bearers in 9th grade, and this was one way of going there.

Why not write about King Arthur, then? Because lots of people (including Sutcliff) have done it already, and anyway I found Aneirin in The Shining Company more interesting...

Where can I find more information about the series? Check out my blog.

[traci]

Re:  Underlife.  The PDF seems to be the best formatted; Windows 2003 a close second.  The RTF and txt versions don't have good paragraph delineation.  I converted it with mobicreator and sent it to Kindle.  It reads just fine though the start of the actual book is just sort of mushed into the license stuff at the beginning.  For reference, it's location 79.

The web site says that Underlife has a creative commons license, does anyone know if this means we might see a Kindle formatted version on Feedbooks anytime soon?

Traci

[Ann in Arlington]

Sounds good, auntmarge, I downloaded it.

thanks!

Ann