Free ebooks!

These free ebooks or etexts may be read on a computer using a simple text editor or viewer. The books are in the 'public domain' in Australia and all have been prepared by volunteers. Read about the background to PG. and read about ebook readers and ways to read the free ebooks available from this site.

BROWSE
our list of free ebooks

Browse all our FREE EBOOKS in AUTHOR order! Or browse our list of TITLES. Most are exclusive to this site. Nearly 2,000 titles to choose from! Or, go directly to one of our popular ebooks:

• Animal Farm by George Orwell
• The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald
• Lady Chatterley's Lover by D H Lawrence
• Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
• Between the Acts by Virginia Woolf

AUSTRALIANA
free ebooks

• Library of Australiana. Free ebooks by Australian writers, or about Australia!
• Australia's Greatest Books. A number of Australian 'classics' which are available as free etexts.
• Dictionary of Australian Biography. Biographies of more than 1000 people prominent in the development of Australia; explorers, artists, politicians, scientists, etc. All died before the end of 1942. An online free ebook.
• Australian Explorers. A chronology of Australian exploration with links to relevant free ebooks, together with an extensive list of Australian explorers and their biographies.
• Australian Explorers Journals. A virtual library of free ebooks, written by the explorers themselves.
• Australian History. Free ebooks relating to Australian History.
• The First Fleet. Details of the First Fleet which arrived in Australia in 1788.
• Australian Discovery. The first authenticated landing on Australian soil occurred in 1606. In 2006 Australians celebrated the 400th anniversary of the event. This page covers the period from 1606-1770. Many free ebooks.
• Timeline of Australian History. A list of of significant dates in Australian History.

OTHER INFORMATION
about our free ebooks

• The Treasure Chest: News and Reviews
• Past Newsletters. Read past copies of our monthly newsletter.
• List of birth and death dates. A list of the birth and death date of a large number of authors.
• Submitting eBooks to Project Gutenberg Australia. Guidelines for the submission of ebooks.
• Project Gutenberg Australia licence details.
• LINKS to other literary sites and resources to assist Project Gutenberg volunteers.
• GUTINDEX_AUS. A list of free ebooks posted to this site.
• Help with downloading our ebooks

RECENT ADDITIONS
Check out details of our
latest releases.

NEWSLETTER
Read past copies of our
monthly newsletter.

SPECIAL INTEREST
free ebooks

• Dr. Widger's Library. Dr David Widger has submitted numerous ebooks to Project Gutenberg in the US. They are all listed here, with links to enable them to be download from PG. Check out "Widger's Quotations", memorable quotes gleaned from the texts themselves.
• 'SF'.--Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Superhero Fiction, Swords Fiction, Sorcery Fiction, Spies Fiction, Supernatural Fiction and Scary Fiction. Free ebooks. Read a book today!
• Crime and Mystery. Crime and Mystery titles from our extensive collection!
• Bestsellers. A list of the top ten bestselling books in both fiction and non-fiction categories for the years 1923 through 1953. Many are available from this site as free ebooks and links are provided. Read a bestselling book today!
• The Western World's Classics. More than 500 world 'classics', most of which are available as free ebooks.
• Women Writers. Books in our collection by 20th Century female authors.
• Rare Books. A collection of page images of rare and important books.
• Children's Literature--Free ebooks of classic children's stories.
• Biography and Autobiography. Biographical and Autobiographical free ebooks at Project Gutenberg Australia and Project Gutenberg
• Voyages and Travels. Free ebooks covering Voyages and Travels in all parts of the world.
• Nobel Laureates at Project Gutenberg. A list of winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature whose books are represented at Gutenberg Australia and Project Gutenberg.
• Cookery and Home Science.--Free ebooks covering cooking the old-fashioned way.
• History of wine-making in Australia. Links to resources on this site and other internet sites.
• Karen People of Burma.
• Papua New Guinea

ebook readers

Ebooks are digitised versions of paper books. That is to say, they are computer files. The ebooks available from Project Gutenberg Australia, all of which are free of charge, are usually provided in 'txt' or 'html' format and can be read on any personal computer or laptop, using a text editor such as Notepad, which comes bundled with every copy of Microsoft Windows. However, when this basic method is used to read ebooks one is not able to bookmark pages for future reference or jump to a particular chapter from the Table of Contents.

These shortcomings, have been overcome by the development of software specifically designed to read ebooks on personal computers and laptops. Outstanding examples are Tom's eTextReader from Fellnersoft and yBook and yRead from Spacejock Software. This software boasts many features to make the experience of reading ebooks more rewarding. The yRead software will even read the book back to you, using a synthesised voice. You want more, I hear you say. Well, both offerings are free of charge and can be downloaded directly from the internet sites mentioned in this paragraph. Microsoft Reader software, for both PC an PocketPC is also very popular. The meaning of words can be looked up in a dictionary, and bookmarks can be added. Check out the Microsoft Reader site. Go to the Download page for free downloads.

Of course, books are not usually read while one is sitting in front of a computer. We want to be able to carry them with us and read them while sitting on a train, or while resting in an easy chair or at the beach. This need for mobility precipitated the development of proprietary ebook reading devices (ereaders). Such devices have been around for quite a few years now, with varying degrees of success. Recently we have seen the release of several new offerings, including the Sony Reader and the Amazon Kindle. The iRex iLiad, iRex DR1000S, HanLin and Cybook are ebook readers which are also available in Australia, at the time of writing this article.

The software available for use with these devices often allows for ebook files to be converted into a format which makes the ebooks easier to read on a particular device's screen. The 'epub' format, a free and open standard set by the International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF), may, in time, become a universal standard for ebook publishing so that ebooks published in epub format can be read on any ereader. An Australian site which sells inexpensive ebooks in epub format is epub ebook editions.

Many people use a personal digital assistant (PDA) or mobile phone, such as the iPhone, to read ebooks. One usually needs to convert the basic text file, which comprises the ebook, into a file format more suitable for display on the device's screen. Plucker software was specifically developed for just this purpose and may be downloaded from the Plucker site, free of charge.

We must mention here the use of the HTML format, which is used universally on web sites to display content. Many of the ebooks available from Project Gutenberg Australia are provided in html format. By using this format, it is possible to display images in the ebooks and to provide a Table of Contents from which users can jump to the start of any chapter in the ebook. The use of coloured text and different printer fonts can also be used to enhance the appearance, readability and utility of the ebook. Some of the software and devices mentioned above support html files, however images which are displayed in the html files often cannot be seen on those devices.

This article is intended to provide practical information for people who want to enjoy reading ebooks. Should you require further information please contact us. We will certainly help you if we can. You can also refer to our Help file.

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