Friday Five: Non-Barnes and Noble eBook Sources

Welcome to the first Friday Five! (Alliteration for the win!) On Fridays, I’ll be unleashing top fives, lists with five items, subjects that have five things associated with them. Five shall be the number. Not three nor six but five. (To paraphrase a classic film.)

To kick off, let’s take a look at Non-Barnes and Noble eBook Sources.

A few caveats first: your nook currently won’t display eBooks purchased from a non-Barnes and Noble source in the “My Library” section. In order to access non-BN eBooks, you’ll have to side-load them into the “My Documents” directory. You also won’t have access to the bookmark, highlight, or notes features. You can’t lend these eBooks through the “Lend Me” feature.

What you will have are (likely) more eBooks, many of them DRM-free, and choice.

What You’ll Need:

• nook-compatible eBooks (PDF, ePub, PDB)
• Adobe Digital Editions for DRM ePubs
• Adobe account

1. Fictionwise: Home of micropay rebates, which “rebates” full price of specificied eBooks (such as New York Times bestsellers) to your account. this storefront (owned by BN) offers eBooks in a variety of formats. You’ll want to buy MultiFormat eBooks titles or the “Secure Adobe Format” formats. (You’ll need Adobe Digital Editions or ADE to unlock DRM-formatted eBooks.) Fictionwise also has an annual membership plan that shaves 15 percent off eBook prices and offers other benefits.

2. eReader.com: Another Barnes and Noble-owned eBookstore, eReader also features a version of Fictionwise’s “micropay rebates.” eReader calls them “eReader Rewards,” but the same principal applies. Purchase a $5.00 book with a 50 percent eReader Reward, and eReader.com will drop $2.50 in credits into your account. eReader.com also has a membership club. Instead of directly discounting eBook prices, eReader.com will add 5 percent extra to all eReader Rewards. (If the eBook offers a 15 percent discount to non-members, you’ll get 20 percent of the purchase price credited to your account.)

3. Kobo: Formerly known as ShortCovers, Kobo recently teamed up with Borders to provide an eBook storefront for the beleaguered brick-and-mortar bookseller. Kobo sells a number of ePub eBooks that can be used on a variety of devices, including your nook. (You’ll also need ADE for Kobo eBooks.)

4. O’Reilly: A specialty publisher that focuses on technology and programming, O’Reilly’s books will set you back more than the mainstream eBookstores. Then again, they’re in-depth, well-written tomes on very specific topics. O’Reilly also offers lifetime access to eBook purchases, and they notify you if the book has been updated. Choose from DRM-free ePub or PDF.

Bonus: Many of O’Reilly’s books feature Dead Tree/eBook bundles, which means you have access to both at a very reasonable price.

5. OverDrive: If you have a local library that participates in OverDrive, you can use the online service to reserve eBooks, to download eBooks to your computer, and to read on your nook. You’ll also need ADE to read ePubs checked out from your local library. (Have you spotted a pattern? Get ADE, and activate it because you will likely use it at some point.) If you’re not sure if your local library (or a neighboring library) has partnered with OverDrive, use the handy Search feature.

If you don’t have a nook but have an eReader that supports ePubs and PDFs, you can use any of these eBook sources.

This is just a small taste of the resources at your fingertips. Do you have another great eBook source that you use? Have you heard of a great source for eBooks? Let us know by posting here or in the forum.