A Retard's Guide to E-Books - A Reference for Retards Who Wish to Read More using Electronic Formats

[actually a cat]

I have a hand-me-down iPad from 2013 that I read shit on every so often before bed. It's nice, but I detest the outdated software and I refuse to pay a premium for any new Apple product.

come join me in kobo land, fren

Seriously tho, you will need a kobo account to set it up, and download exactly one software update, and then you can just turn the wifi off forever and never touch the account again. I just pirate books on my laptop and connect it via USB and then drag and drop. I actually resisted ebook readers for years because of the needless contrived faggotry generated by apple and amazon.
Kobo nia was the simplest way I could could find around it.

 

[Haffhart]

Android tablets would be nice if Google didn't give up on providing a coherent tablet UI for AOSP after the 3.x series failed miserably. That TouchWiz on Samsung tablets and FireOS on the Fire HD tablets are better optimised is a fucking travesty because I hate Samsung and Amazon tooling so fucking much.

Amazon Fire tablets are the best budget tablets you can get. They're well-built despite going on sale for $100 USD and under all the time. You can (and should) use Fire Toolbox to remove the spyware and bloatware to your taste - you can remove everything Amazon and make the tablet a stock Android or just turn off things like spyware and Alexa, it's up to you. Look up Fire Toolbox on the XDA Developer Forums and YouTube.

Anyway, I use Lithium to read ebooks on Android. It's simple and free, that's all I need. But since Z-Library was Assanged I haven't been able to get any new books. Fuck.

EDIT: Oh it really is back up for now. A honey pot maybe?It always amazed me how there are so many books on Z-Lib yet people only use it for textbooks. And it seems to have been taken down after it went trending on TikTok. TikTok is Hell.

 

[Oddjob OTP]

Fire Tablets are pretty good, I keep trying to justify a Paperwhite because I don't actually use tablets for anything else and prefer the eInk screen to backlit but I never get around to it. I mostly read shitty fan transactions of nip Light Novels/Web Novels as eBooks since no paper version will ever exist unless you pay someone to print it but when I look for real books I go to IRC channels dedicated to eBooks like Bookz on Undernet.

 

[Bravefart]

If you want to brouse new releases of mostly sci-fi and fantasy iBookpile is pretty good. TorrentGalaxy seems to be the best for up to date general books.

This VK account has some stuff on it that I couldn't get anywhere else.

 

[AbyssStarer]

It's not really an eReader but I use the Nook Lenovo 10 inch tablet. It's really just the Lenovo tab with Nook affiliation, but it runs android so I can use it to read manga from Tachiyomi, an app that scrapes manga websites and lets you download chapters and whatnot.
I used to have a Nook Color and just went with Nook again because I like the reader app the most and wanted an android. Otherwise I would have gotten a Kobo Klara HD.

Oh, I just remembered that last year Google made them disable the B&N bookstore on that tablet (something about bypassing the app store for purchases) so you need to buy ebooks online from Barnes & Noble and side load them. That's why I never updated my Nook app on the thing.

I made the mistake of updating the Nook app on my phone and it removed all my side loaded books and I switched to ReadEra because it pissed me off.

Paper is the ultimate medium for books, but audiobooks are perfect for schlock. Out of podcasts and long videos to listen to? Queue up some dime-a-dozen romance books or whatever the heck and go.

 

[David Brown]

I use the @Voice app on Android to get TTS for trash novels or light nonfiction works that don't require study to fully understand. If you have a good wifi or data connection it uses google voice synthesis to get a fairly pleasant robo voice to read to you, and if you don't have WiFi you can use the built in robo voice which is one step above moon man. I find it quite listenable. It has a one time purchase license for pro features and no ads that I thought was worth it.

 

[You gain Brouzouf]

Does anyone know of an e-book reader with decent support for text to speech?
My vision is exceedingly terrible to the point where reading for an extended amount of time is slow and frustrating compared to having the dulcet tones of a robot just speed through the same text in a quarter of the time.
Generally this isn't an issue because I just tts most text for informational purposes and use audiobooks when I want to "read" for leisure.
The problem I'm encountering now is that there are several textbooks with a focus on visual examples while still having useful written text. These books don't have any official audiobook and likely will never receive one.
Most readers I've tried have some support for tts but it's typically very lackluster or even nearly nonfunctional an doffer very little in the way of control. The best result I've had so far is by just dropping my PDFs directly into Microsoft Edge which at least lets me listen to the text, though like I said control is very limited.
Ignoring the built in tts features and just trying to use normal methods through any narrator software has never worked even a little bit.

Does anyone have any suggestions? or are PDFs just too cucked and I just have to deal with it

Edit: just saw this post

I use the @Voice app on Android to get TTS for trash novels or light nonfiction works that don't require study to fully understand. If you have a good wifi or data connection it uses google voice synthesis to get a fairly pleasant robo voice to read to you, and if you don't have WiFi you can use the built in robo voice which is one step above moon man. I find it quite listenable. It has a one time purchase license for pro features and no ads that I thought was worth it.

While this is interesting and I may check it out, I am specifically looking for desktop solutions.
Just thought I'd clarify since there was a post about tts and e-books directly above mine.

 

[Paul Atreides]

I thought I was the only one who couldn't read anything long on a computer. Protip: listen to ambient Silent Hill music (or any ambient music) on youtube. Helped me out alot.
I'm still a physical purist though.

 

[Kookin]

I have not managed to finish a single book in my life. Should I read the Alchemist or something for starters? I heard books like that are what introduced many people to the interest and commit to it. Hopefully I'm not asking to be spoon-fed too much by asking for a book recommendation.
No, I'm not asking for commitment advice. I'll look into that on my own.

 

[Llaeros]

Highly recommend a dedicated e-reader for this. It's way better than a tablet/laptop/phone in terms of eyestrain, comfort, and usability. Kindle, Nook, doesn't matter.

Also #bookz was still going on IRC when I last checked, so that's another good source for material.

 

[Dread First]

Does anyone know of an e-book reader with decent support for text to speech?
My vision is exceedingly terrible to the point where reading for an extended amount of time is slow and frustrating compared to having the dulcet tones of a robot just speed through the same text in a quarter of the time.
Generally this isn't an issue because I just tts most text for informational purposes and use audiobooks when I want to "read" for leisure.
The problem I'm encountering now is that there are several textbooks with a focus on visual examples while still having useful written text. These books don't have any official audiobook and likely will never receive one.
Most readers I've tried have some support for tts but it's typically very lackluster or even nearly nonfunctional an doffer very little in the way of control. The best result I've had so far is by just dropping my PDFs directly into Microsoft Edge which at least lets me listen to the text, though like I said control is very limited.
Ignoring the built in tts features and just trying to use normal methods through any narrator software has never worked even a little bit.

Does anyone have any suggestions? or are PDFs just too cucked and I just have to deal with it

Edit: just saw this post

While this is interesting and I may check it out, I am specifically looking for desktop solutions.
Just thought I'd clarify since there was a post about tts and e-books directly above mine.

If it helps, you can use Calibre to convert EPUB files to PDF and then listen to the PDF through Edge.

I have not managed to finish a single book in my life. Should I read the Alchemist or something for starters? I heard books like that are what introduced many people to the interest and commit to it. Hopefully I'm not asking to be spoon-fed too much by asking for a book recommendation.
No, I'm not asking for commitment advice. I'll look into that on my own.

Let’s start off simple. Think of a good book from your school years. Doesn’t matter if it’s immature, childish, or if you have hazy recollections of it. That’s the book you’ll be looking forward to reading first.

Don’t get yourself into a mindset where you’re forcing yourself to read because you’ll be digging your heels against the idea. Start off with things you remember enjoying.

Captain Underpants? Because of Winn Dixie? The Wayside School books? Eragon? Diary of a Wimpy Kid? The Magic Tree House? RL Stein’s Goosebumps? The Ellen Hopkins Crank trilogy? Come on dude. Get those gears a turnin and decide for yourself what book you wanna read.

 

[Administrator Flotsam]

I have not managed to finish a single book in my life. Should I read the Alchemist or something for starters? I heard books like that are what introduced many people to the interest and commit to it. Hopefully I'm not asking to be spoon-fed too much by asking for a book recommendation.
No, I'm not asking for commitment advice. I'll look into that on my own.

No, just like the guy above me, I'd recommend starting with something you like. The Alchemist is more of a self-help type novel that's read for personal improvement and not as much for entertainment; at least from what I've heard of it.

Consider what kind of stuff you've read on the internet an liked and corelate it with a type of book. Ie like scary stories / creepypasta? Look for a good horror book. Like stuff like greentext or lolcow stories? Try reading something biographical. Like reading game reviews? Read some broad-stroke literary critique. If you don't read much on the internet either, then post what topics you're interested in I (we) can suggest something good.

Some recommended stuff I think will be fun to read regardless of interest:
-The Color of Outer Space by HP Lovecraft (horror short story that also a bit sci-fi-ey)
-Animal Farm by George Orwell (political commentary in the form of an animal fable-like novel, free of poltisperging)
-The Adventure of the Devil's Foot from the Last Bow of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle (detective short story but its Doyle's scariest one and its interesting as fuck)
All of them are relatively short reads and should keep you interested throughout the read (as they did for me).

But again, post what you're specifically interested in you can get more customized recs.

 

[Ughubughughughughughghlug]

Physical books are for snobs and posers. You can save a ton of money on Kindle books to the point that it quickly pays for itself. You can have your whole library on hand at all times and if you lose the Kindle you just buy another one (which, again, pays for itself quickly). You can bookmark pages so that notable passages can be brought up again quickly.

I would consider buying physical copies of specific novels I especially liked for a display bookshelf, but otherwise I read on the Kindle even if the prices are the same.

 

[Monolith]

"Every book ever written" my ass.

 

[Harambe]

I have not managed to finish a single book in my life. Should I read the Alchemist or something for starters? I heard books like that are what introduced many people to the interest and commit to it. Hopefully I'm not asking to be spoon-fed too much by asking for a book recommendation.
No, I'm not asking for commitment advice. I'll look into that on my own.

Good first books:
HHhH. Incredibly short chapters. Basically a novel for people with short attention spans. No chapter exceeds like 3 pages. Good book about paratrooper nationalists parachuting into occupied Czechoslovakia to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich and also reminisces of the awesome pussy there from a fictionalized version of the author. Eminently readable, keeps you moving. Prestigious and makes you seem learned to bring it up. Historically accurate enough for casual conversation. It’s the exact kind of perfect normie book, adds to status and is fun and easy to read.

Normans in the South:
A fantastic history book by a travel writer who loves Italy, detailing a little known portion of history with fantastic implications. A story of an adventurer genius who rose from petty criminality to mastery over the Mediterranean. An amazing tale and again, has the wonderful qualities of fiction, the fun of obscure but meaningful knowledge, and an earnest tour guide’s love of the subject matter and absolute surprise at medieval history being such a fantastic journey.

The Time of the Magicians:
A bit more advanced but it helps you understand the torpor of modern philosophy and explains it in the best language possible, that of biography. All philosophy is just a cope for the sexual and personal dysfunctions of brilliant but unoccupied men. This book demonstrates that and shows what can be achieved by this kind of man. It examines the origins of the Frankfurt school, the philosophy that has dominated you your entire life, the alternatives, and the men who created them. A worthy read at any time. Simply enjoyable.

Measuring the World:
A very fun novelistic accounting of the Enlightenment fixation with measurement and science taken to the extreme of impracticality. Builds well on a simple knowledge base of science and geography and invites you to ponder the character of the men who gave us the world we know today, without inane categories like racist or genocide. It’s a fun read about people at the edge of modernity in a time where madness and education coincided and left you an opportunity to live completely unchecked in far flung and exotic locations.