Read e-books using your Web browser (like Internet Explorer or Firefox). The Library subscribes to a few collections and there are some Web sites with collections of free e-books.

•  Credo Reference
  Read general reference and subject-specific books spanning the humanities, social sciences and sciences.
•  NetLibrary E-books and Downloadable Audiobooks
  Find Cliff’s Notes, business, computers, education, social sciences and much more.
• Project Gutenberg
  A collection of older literary works out of copyright.
• Online Books Page
  Lists more than 25,000 free books on the Web.
• The Literature Network
  Many literary classics including 1,900 full books, over 3,000 short stories and poems by over 250 authors.
• Bartelby.com
  Read classic works online.
• Google Book Search
  Search inside full-text online books. Find entire e-books available for free or read snippets of books for purchase.

These two services will e-mail you snippets of a book daily -- some send the entire book over the course of weeks or months, some send you a part of the first chapter as an introduction to the work.

•  Online Book Clubs (from Dear Reader)
  Join the online book club to receive excerpts from a featured book in your e-mail daily. Subscribe to fiction, non-fiction, business, mystery and more. If you like the first part of the book, you can then check it out from the Library.
• Daily Lit
  Read an easily digestible bite of out-of-copyright classics daily in your e-mail until you finish the book.

Have a smart phone or other mobile device on which you'd like to read an e-book? First, check your device documentation for more details to see which file types are supported.

•  Overdrive
  This collection has e-books for checkout in PDF, EPUB and MOBI (protected) formats. If your device supports one of these, take a look at the selections.
• Feedbooks
  Feedbooks offers books in EPUB, MOBI and PDF. If your device supports one of these, take a look at the selections.

Librarians get lots of questions about e-book readers like the Sony Reader, Amazon Kindle, etc. These devices are designed to purchase books directly from the supporting bookstore or online store. Because of the variety of devices and compatibility issues, Library staff cannot answer specific questions about e-book readers. 

Library E-book Downloads
The Library subscribes to a small collection of e-books that are compatible with some e-book readers.

•  Overdrive
  In this collection, find downloads compatible with many readers:
  • EPUB (protected with Digital Rights Management (DRM))
  • PDF (protected with DRM)
  more help from Overdrive »

Compatibility of some popular e-book readers

• Amazon Kindle
  
  Supported formats: AZW (Kindle proprietary format), MOBI (non-DRM), PDF (non-DRM), TXT
  Supported formats with copyright protection (DRM): Downloads from Kindle Store only
  See Amazon Kindle online help » 
  
• Barnes & Noble Nook
  
  Supported formats: PDF, EPUB, eReader, PDB
  Supported formats with copyright protection (DRM): EPUB, eReader, PDF
  Includes downloads from Overdrive
  See Nook online help » 
  
• Sony Reader
  
  Supported formats: BBeB, PDF, EPUB, TXT, RTF
  Supported formats with copyright protection (DRM): BBeB, EPUB, PDF
  Includes downloads from Overdrive
  See Sony Reader online help » 
  
  Adapted from MobileRead Wiki E-book Reader Matrix

Free E-book Downloads

There are a few good Web sites with collections that include open-access/public domain titles that can be used on some readers.

• Feedbooks
  Feedbooks offers books in a variety of formats including EPUB, MOBI and PDF. If your device supports one of these, take a look at the selections. Start with the help page.
  
• Google Books Classics
  Google Books has many classic titles for download in EPUB (without DRM). Many devices (except Amazon Kindle) support this format. Learn more on the Google Books Blog.
  
• Project Gutenberg
  Project Gutenberg offers books in a variety of formats including EPUB, MOBI, TXT and HTML. If your device supports one of these, take a look at the selections. Start with the help page.