[Katsunami]

Even though my eyesight is poor, I'm not blind, so I can read normal books. Still, I've been wondering about this.

Does a dedicated TTS-device that reads EPUBs exist?

I'm thinking along the lines of an iPod Shuffle, or one of those very simple USB-stick type MP3-players without a screen. It would have controls like an audio player, like this:

Home: Go to Home.
Pause/Play: Start speaking titles when on Home-screen, otherwise continue/start TTS from the current position in the book.
Back / Forward: Flip a page. The reader says something like: "Backward, page 211" when pressing the button. It's not necessary to flip pages while the reader is TTS-ing.
Rewind: Go to the beginning of the book.

And some stuff for menu's / TOC and so on, for which a menu button could be used, and back/forward function like an up/down button, for example.

I know there are TTS-applications for phones and tablets, and reading applications with TTS, but these require sight to operate. If a dedicated device has 25 books loaded or so, then it doesn't require sight; maybe a person is able to reload the device using a computer, or if not, a family member or caretaker can reload it if necessary.

Does something like this exist? I've been looking, just out of curiousity, but I can't find anything.

Of course, it would be possible to use a TTS application on the computer, record its output to MP3, and use an MP3-player, but that's a lengthy way to do it.

Audiobooks are expensive, and braille books even more so. ($130 per Lord of the Rings volume :X)