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#1 |
Enthusiast
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Join Date: Mar 2011
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PDF Freebies in Scifi/Urban fantasy?
Hi, I'm looking for free books to download and mail to a deployed soldier that I have "adopted." I'm slow on how to do any converting as I use an itouch for all my reading. He only has adobe reader on his pc and no internet access so I mail him discs. Thanks so much!
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#2 |
Reading is sexy
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The Baen free library offers a lot of free sci-fi books for download. One of the highly recommended ones (though I've yet to read it) is On Basilisk Station, the first in the Honor Harrington series. (The second book is also free.)
They don't offer these books in PDF, but you could use the HTML version and put the unzipped folders on a disc. He'll be able to open them in any internet browser. Alternately, if he has the ability to install software on the computer (is it his computer, or a public computer?), you could send him the installation file for a common ebook filetype. I would suggest the ePub format, though I'm not familiar with all the software. I use Calibre, but I primarily use it as an ebook library management tool... it's overly bloated if all you need is a reader. The Suvudu Library sometimes offers PDF shorts from SF&F magazine. Here are a few I found: http://sf-fantasy.suvudu.com/2010/11...-magazine.html http://sf-fantasy.suvudu.com/2011/01...is-lawson.html http://sf-fantasy.suvudu.com/2010/09...y-ken-liu.html http://suvudu.com/2010/08/suvudu-lib...-mcmullen.html http://sf-fantasy.suvudu.com/2010/07...-addition.html Last edited by queentess; 03-13-2011 at 11:01 PM. Reason: missing word |
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#3 |
Reading is sexy
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Oh my, I forgot to mention the Vorkosigan series!
http://www.webscription.net/p-1290-w...pprentice.aspx Just click the download links that are about in the middle of the page (to the immediate left of the book description) and you can download for free. |
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#4 |
Wizzard
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A few sf/fantasy authors who offer works free to download from their websites in PDF format:
Peter Watts, Hugo Award-winning sf John Moore, comedic fantasy John Dalmas, military-type sf/fantasy Cory Doctorow, popularized the free download for free publicity to boost print sales meme Mayer Alan Brenner, put 4 of his comic fantasy novels online for free download. Not the urban fantasy you're asking for, but maybe your friend would like to try something different. Lewis Shiner, World Fantasy Award-winner, has put up a lot of his modern fantasy/horror-ish stuff up. Mainly short stories, but occasionally a novel. I suggest looking into seeing if your friend can use some form of software to read ePub. Perhaps a copy of Portable Firefox with the Lucifox or ePubReader add-ons installed could be used. Actually, I'd recommend Lucifox which he could run off a USB stick without having to copy all his books into the userdata like ePubReader likes to do. Hope this helps, and welcome to MobileRead! |
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#5 |
Enthusiast
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You guys/gals are great. Thanks for the links. He has no access to Internet whatsoever so he can't download any other programs. I'm trying to figure out how to convert lol but hoping just to find PDFs.
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#6 |
Grand Sorcerer
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If he likes older SF/F stuff you can find some at Manybooks.net in pdf format as well.
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#7 |
Grand Sorcerer
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You can give him a disc with Portable Firefox with Epub Reader Plugin or Lucifox (I hadn't heard of that one before) installed on it--download the portable program to a flash drive or memory card, install it there, open it & browse to the epub reader plugin & install; put the whole folder on a disc with ebooks. (Portable Apps also has a couple of PDF readers that are smaller than Adobe Reader, and don't require installation on a hard drive.)
Baen also has the Fifth Imperium CD collection--discs that were sold with the hardcover books, containing complete series of ebooks. Legit, free to share & copy. You can also check out the books at Feedbooks.com; those have PDF options, including custom-sized PDFs. |
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#8 |
Wizard
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Mike Brotherton has made his book _Star Dragon_ freely available as a .pdf (I did the formatting for him using LaTeX):
http://www.mikebrotherton.com/novels/stardragon.pdf William |
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#9 | |
Reading is sexy
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Quote:
![]() As Elfwreck says above, you can send him on a disc the install file for Firefox and the ePub reader add-on. |
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#10 |
Connoisseur
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Other SF authors with free fiction:
John Jackson Miller (Star Wars books set before the movies) John Scalzi Charles Stross Phoenix Pick/ offers one SF book from their catalog free each month for signing up for their mailing list Free short story collection |
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#11 |
Addict
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I've been enjoying back issues of Ray Gun Revival. It's an online magazine that specializes in Golden-Age style sci-fi. While their current method of publication is to release stories throughout the month, you can find the PDF back issues from their first run at http://www.everydayfiction.com/forum...ard,120.0.html .
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