reading

Think publishers charge too much for e-books? Maybe so, but there's one price you can't beat: free.

Amazon routinely offers Kindle e-books at no charge, either permanently or temporarily. The tricky part is finding them, especially if you want to browse the freebies by category.

There are, of course, ways to score free books for your Kindle (or Nook), as well as matchmaking sites for e-book borrowing and lending.

Now there's another resource: Hundred Zeros catalogs many of the free Kindle e-books currently available through Amazon, updating its listings every hour so you're always seeing the … Read more

To the delight of many an avid reader, fan-favorite iOS bookmarking app Instapaper has finally made its way to the Android platform. Built by mobile-app developer Mobelux, the official Instapaper app brings its dead-simple interface and monochromatic design to a swath of new users.

If you're not familiar with Instapaper, it's a tool that lets you quickly and easily save articles for reading later. So, if you don't have time to dive into that lengthy blog post or interview, you can simply use Instapaper to create a short-term (or long-term) bookmark, and easily pull it up at … Read more

Flipboard is a must-have newsreader and social network hub that lets you organize the info you want to look at and then flip through it like a magazine. Get started by creating an account with Flipboard, then sign in to your Facebook and Twitter accounts.

Once you're all signed in, Flipboard presents you with an intuitive layout of your social networks and some default news categories to browse. Touching a panel lets you browse through any of the default categories. But touching and holding a panel lets you delete it and replace it with whatever you want. To customize … Read more

Nokia Lumia owners in Europe will soon be able to pick up and read some of their favorite books through their smartphones.

Like other online bookstores, Nokia Reading is part app and part service. Lumia users will be able to find, browse, buy, and download books written their own native languages along with a host of English-language titles. And thousands of familiar classics will be available for free, according to Nokia.

Owners of the Lumia 900, 800, 710, and 610 are eligible to use the new book service. The initial rollout is slated for users in France, Germany, Italy, Russia, … Read more

Meet Pocket, the successor to the megapopular short-term bookmarking tool Read It Later. Just as simple and platform-compatible as Read It Later, this new incarnation adds extra features and shows off a completely redesigned interface.

If you're not familiar with Read It Later, it's an incredibly convenient app that's useful in countless scenarios. Say you're on your morning commute and you come across a lengthy article that you can't quite (or don't want to) finish reading. Just add it to your RIL list, and go back to it later. Or say you come across … Read more

When it comes to consuming newspapers on an iPad, I've long preferred PressReader to individual newspaper apps (like, say, USA Today and my local Detroit Free Press). With the latter, I'm just sifting through headlines. But PressReader makes me feel like I'm actually "reading the paper," mostly because it provides a picture-perfect digital reproduction of the real thing.

Now it's letter-perfect as well. PressReader 3.1 has been optimized for Retina displays, meaning newspapers viewed on the new iPad look nothing short of dazzling.

In case you're not familiar with it, the app lets you subscribe to the digital editions of more than 2,000 national and international newspapers -- great for news junkies and folks who want to keep up on what's happening back home.… Read more

This is an update of a deal from a couple months ago.

I love e-books. Always have, always will. My first "e-reader" was a PalmPilot. These days, I read on whatever device is handy: Nook Color, Kindle Fire, and iPhone.

What I find truly incredible is how affordable dedicated e-readers have become. Remember when the original Kindle was $359 -- and Amazon couldn't keep up with the orders?

Anyway, while supplies last, RedTag has the refurbished Barnes & Noble Nook Simple Touch Reader for $69, plus $1.95 for shipping. That's an insanely good deal.

Update: … Read more

A few months ago, I bought a Kindle. The cheap kind: $79, with "Special Offers." I bought it because I wanted to read more efficiently, and because the iPad 2's screen was giving me eye fatigue.

You'd think that with the new Retina Display iPad that my Kindle had been one-upped. Clearer, crisper text is exactly what I was hoping for on an iPad, and it did indeed come to pass. I upgraded to a third-generation iPad, although I did it mainly for storage space and to explore gaming with the new A5X graphics.

Yet, the new iPad hasn't been able to unseat my little old Kindle. Not entirely. In fact, I've been surprised to find that the Kindle has carved out a special place in my heart, and it's one that the iPad has a hard time filling.… Read more

Things might be starting to look up for booksellers, authors, and publishers. A report released today by the Pew Research Center shows that one-fifth of U.S. adults have read an e-book in the last year and that e-reader owners not only prefer to buy rather than borrow books, but they also read more books.

"Those who have taken the plunge into reading e-books stand out in almost every way from other kinds of readers," the report's authors write. "Foremost, they are relatively avid readers of books in all formats: 88 percent of those who read … Read more