I have a rooted Nook Simple Touch. Due to the version of Android, not all of the latest apps will run and it can be difficult to track down old versions.
I've given up using Google Reader as a result and use RSSDemon on the Nook instead. It works very well and is much better for reading on than my iPhone 4S. Other software I use:
- Calibre Library
- Cool Reader
- InstaFetch (for Instapaper)
- Search Market (required to search in the Market)
- Opera Mobile
- ADW
In general, the performance is adequate for all of these apps apart from Opera Mobile.
If you decide to get a Nook Simple Touch for rooting, it's much easier to downgrade the firmware to 1.1.0 than try to do it with 1.2