I asked her for the website she was getting these "free" books. She sent me the link and you guessed it- they were from a pirate website. I told her those sites stole books from authors and often used these "freebies" as ways to sneak trojans and viruses into electronics. I wasn't lying about that. I read it in the pirate ring of hell pamphlet.
The woman told me she couldn't afford to read all the books she wanted to read. She had a voracious, expensive reading habit. So, I sent her a list of all the many ways to get free books without being cursed by writer's wrath.
1. Be a reviewer. Writers will not only give you free books, they might throw in their first born, to gain a reliable reviewer. Places like Net Galley and Online Book Club offer books to readers who are willing to post reviews. Reedsy also invites readers to become reviewers for their Discovery blog.
Or maybe you want to start your own book review blog. Reedsy has an excellent post on that right here.
The best part about being a reviewer, besides the free stories? Usually, reviewers get the books first, before they are published.
Your local library. Remember that magical place with the cool stale air that smelled of aging paper and glue? It's still around and probably online offering free eBook lending programs.
Be a Prime reader. I'm a member of Amazon Prime for the free shipping. At $119 a year, we spend that much on shipping over the holiday season alone, so it's a value for us. The bonus to that is it also comes with FREE reads. Not to be confused with KDP, which offers even more titles for free, there is a catalog of free titles just for Prime members.
Visit Project Gutenberg. With over 60,000 titles to choose from, there's surely one or two books you've been wanting to cross off you to-read list. All of the titles are no longer under copy right and legally (and ethically) free to share.
Check the free lists. Most all of the eBook sites offer free books- even if you're not in a paid program. Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, and Kobo all offer free books.
Newsletters and eBook sites. There are a huge variety of websites and mailing lists devoted to sharing eBooks, many of which are free. ManyBooks, BookBub, Digital Book Today and other sites offer lists of free books and they will send you an email notification of newly released free books.
This isn't even a definitive list. Just google FREE BOOKS and you'll get a huge list of free book sites. How can you tell the legit sites from the pirate sites? Look over the site. Legitimate book sites will have places for authors to submit the books they want to share for free. Pirate sites don't have places for authors to contact them. And be warned! Just like pirate music and movie sites, no one is stealing and sharing content as a courtesy from the kindness of their heart. There is something in it for them and that something could be your personal information!
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| Legitimate site with Author Services |
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| No Author services offered on this site that was listed as the top pirating site by Statista.com |
