Kindle – Read Books, eBooks, Magazines, Newspapers & Textbooks
great functionality and it’s free! buy and read a kajillion (give or take a few) books straight from amazon. my favorite feature of this app is auto syncing. you can read a book on your iPhone and pick up in the same place on your laptop or iPad. there are also a huge number of free kindle books available.
iBooks
buy books through iTunes. checkout New York Times best selling books. download samples before you spend your hard earned dollars. the virtual bookshelf display of your book collection is pretty visually appealing.
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Borders eBooks
are you seeing the trend yet? depending on the brand you want to purchase ebooks from there is an app for you. downloading this app did provide me with several free books to get started. my favorite feature in the Borders app is “Discover” checkout new books, pulitzer winners, Oprah’s Book Club… the list goes on.
NOOK from Barnes & Noble – Read 2 Million Books, Free Books, Magazines, and Newspapers
similar features to the other apps – one unique feature though with Barnes and Noble is the ability to “loan” your ebook to a friend. “Nook users can loan books to friends for two weeks and those e-books can be accessed through PCs or smartphones such as the BlackBerry and the iPhone. Lending the book through Nook makes it unavailable to the original owner, but at the end of the two weeks, the book reverts back to its owner.”
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Goodreads – Book Recommendations and Reviews for great Books and eBooks
while this app won’t allow you to actually read an ebook (clearly there are plenty of those) this is a companion to the social network GoodReads.com where you can keep track of your book reviews, to read books and interact with a growing community about all things books. It’s like a virtual bookclub. I use the app to add books to my “to-read” list. When I’m ready to buy a book (paper or in eformat) I check my to-read list. no more writing book names on the back of receipts in your purse or forgetting what that one speaker said you should check out.
ReadMore
Do you have a stack of books to read? Having trouble finding motivation? ReadMore may be for you.
It’s a reading log, a diary to show you your reading habits and motivate you with relevant feedback. It helps break large books into more manageable pieces and keeps track of your progress. I haven’t used this app yet but I love the idea.
Audible – Audio books, original audio shows, ad-free podcasts, and more.
if you’re not into ebooks but prefer the audiobook variety I highly recommend Audible. While the app is free you will need a membership to audible.com to purchase books. I’m a big fan of audiobooks. I listen to book when I’m in traffic or traveling and I was very excited when the app became available.
Bluefire Reader
This reader app is unique in that you can read books in multiple formats. The other branded ereaders require you to purchase books from their store. Through iTunes you can sync PDF files to read in BlueFire. I had a few PDF variety ebooks that were from websites or sent to me to preview books before they are launched and I can now read them on both my iPhone and iPad. Because I read from the PDF file it doesn’t remember my place (small price to pay for flexibility). BlueFire is your answer to reading DRM books – see article on sidebar about library books.
Zinio – The World’s Magazine Newsstand
if you’re not the book reading type but want to keep up with your magazine addiction without carrying around a stack of magazines at all times then you may want to look into subscribe to your favorite magazines through Zinio. The magazines you subscribe to will be saved in your account for use on multiple devices.
MobileRSS Free ~ Google RSS News Reader
last and certainly not least, those of us who are bookworms also tend to like to read blogs. whether you read the blog of your favorite author or have a wider variety blog interests MobileRSS syncs with your google reader account to allow you to access your RSS feeds on the road.
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