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First Look: Classics

Have you ever been stuck on a train, plane, or bus and wanted a good book to read? With Classics [iTunes Link], you can easily pick up your iPhone and begin reading a small collection of classic literature and novels. As I mentioned last week, Classics takes a new approach to reading books on the iPhone.

The book selection interface reminds us of Delicious Library, as it has a wooden bookcase with the library of books stacked on it -- the developers will add new books with future (free) updates. You can re-arrange your books by tapping on a book and dragging it around. Once you select a book, it will load, and you will see the reading view. If you are continuing where you left off, a bookmark will appear and slide off the page; otherwise, you will presented with the first page of the book. To turn the page, you simply slide your finger in a page-turning motion (right to left or left to right, depending on if you want to go forward or backwards respectively). The page turning is really addictive, and you'll find yourself reading quickly through the text just so you can flip to the next page -- yes, it's really that addictive.

By tapping on the list icon in the top-right corner, you will be presented with an index of the chapters; you can tap on any of these chapters to jump to the beginning of the section. When you tap the back button in the top-left, a bookmark will slide onto the page, saving your place for later.

After extensive testing over the past two weeks, I have become addicted to reading in Classics. But, there are some improvements I would like to see. There is a good selection of books to read, but I would like to see this list expand (and bring more recent books to the bookshelf). I would also like to be able to search through one (or all) of the books to find a single passage. In addition, the ability to control the font size would be nice. Overall, this application is stellar, and while there is some room for improvement, I would have to agree that this is a great way to read older books on the go. Classics is definitely not a mainstream eBook reader, because you cannot add your own books. So, if you're looking for a reader that gives you more flexibility, you might want to try Stanza [iTunes Link].

You can download Classics from the iTunes Store for an introductory price of $2.99. Be sure to take a look at our gallery of screenshots.



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iPhone App Store iPod touch

Have you ever been stuck on a train, plane, or bus and wanted a good book to read? With Classics [iTunes Link], you can easily pick up your...
 

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boatofcar

Since when is a product review an advertisement? With ebook readers, you get what you pay for. You can't compare Stanza's UI with Classics'. It's like the people who complain that Linux doesn't get enough attention--most people neither have the time nor desire to tool around with something to get it to work.

November 06 2008 at 5:08 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Don O'Shea

One aspect that bothers me is the center flexing of the page. No one pulls a page from its center. The page turn should be from a corner. Preferably the top corner. Otherwise, it looks great.

November 04 2008 at 4:47 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to Don O'Shea's comment
quasimoto

Yeah, I noticed this too while using the app. I think they should make it so that when I slide my finger in any area to turn the page, it should show the flexing animation in that area too.

November 05 2008 at 10:48 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
boatofcar

Even though the animation (strangely) starts from the center, you can turn from whatever right-hand part of the screen you want.

November 06 2008 at 8:17 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Ian

I think I'll give this one a try.

November 03 2008 at 11:19 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
spyker

Been reading 20,000 leagues for a while in this app. Great app.

November 03 2008 at 4:54 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Michael

I'm enjoying this app already. Nicely done.

One suggestion: I'd love to be able to tap on a word to look up its dictionary definition (like I can on a Mac with right-click). These old classics use a number of fairly archaic words and it would be great to look them up as I'm reading.

November 03 2008 at 4:14 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Simon

As someone gets car-sick reading a regular book, just the thought of reading one on my iPhone makes me queasy.

It's a nifty idea, but I just don't see anyone reading an entire book in it.

November 03 2008 at 11:21 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
6453893

"and bring more recent books to the bookshelf"

Never gonna happen. These books are only available because they've entered the public domain. You won't see any book get in until AT LEAST sixty years after the author's death. I'm guessing you'll be in your eighties or nineties before, say, Kurt Vonnegut's books could be added to Classics, if the iPhone even lasts that long.

November 03 2008 at 10:58 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to 6453893's comment
fablloyd

Very good point and public domain. To compare, the Stanza desktop app, while a bit clunky, allows for syncing from .lit, .epub, .txt, and .pdf. As far as more options, Stanza allows for more formats.

November 03 2008 at 3:34 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
KarlW

It's called classics for a reason - these are classic books. Additions should be things like the divine comedy, the aeneid, odyssey, illiad...etc

November 03 2008 at 5:02 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Matthew

Also, as a Stanza user, looking at the youtube video for Classics makes it readily apparent that Classics is a whole lot easier to read, and includes images from the novels, making it a more polished ipod app.

November 03 2008 at 10:43 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Matthew's comment
Eric S

I have eReader and stanza, but I think classics looks like a much nicer app, the problem being the very limited selection of ebooks for classics, if I could get all the classics I have with the others and read books from somthing like ereader it would be great and I would switch to the paid product in a hurry

November 03 2008 at 10:52 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
fablloyd

Mentioning this program without mentioning free options like Stanza is unfortunate. Espepecially with the impulse and ease to buy.

November 03 2008 at 10:33 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
4 replies to fablloyd's comment
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