How about clearing the machine of books, formatting and doing a factory reset through menus and leaving on charge overnight on a wall charger.
As for choices of reader.... Sony 350s, 650s, couple of Elonexs, Bookeen Opus and that's just my local Waterstones, PC World, Currys, Black or whatever they want to call themselves have Kindles and their are some other minor ones around... seems UK has fair range available... well, at least England does...
