iBooks love: free e-books worth reading

The National Association of Scholars just published a list of brain-challenging books that they recommend for college reading programs, but which should be of interest to any passionate adult-level reader. These books were selected for presenting important, well-argued ideas with a level of complexity that stretches the mind -- basically they function as upgraded "beach reading" for the scholarly set.

Many of these titles are freely downloadable in ePub format and can be synced to iBooks for your portable reading pleasure. Here's a quick run-down of some of the recommended books, along with quick links to iBooks-compatible downloads.

Flatland by Edwin Abbot (Illustrated version)
Confessions by St. Augustine
Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan (Also available in iTunes Audiobook format)
The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper (Illustrated version)
Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin (Illustrated version, also available in MP3 audio)
American Notes for General Circulation by Charles Dickens
Autobiography by Ben Franklin
The Blithedale Romance by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Kim by Rudyard Kipling
Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis
Speeches and Letters, Abraham Lincoln (the article refers to Speeches and Writings, so I hope I linked to the correct ePub here...)
On Liberty by John Stuart Mills (PDF but iBooks-compatible)
Apology of Socrates by Plato
Crito by Plato
Parallel Lives by Plutarch (Updated link)
Essay on Criticism by Alexander Pope
Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain (Illustrated version, also available as an audio book)
Candide by Voltaire (Illustrated version, also available as an audio book)
Eight Years of Trouble in Samoa, Robert Louis Stevenson

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Source: http://www.nas.org/polArticles.cfm?Doc_Id=1545

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The National Association of Scholars just published a list of brain-challenging books that they recommend for college reading programs, but...

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PSTMD

Strangely, Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky and Confidence-Man by Melville are free on Kindle but not on iBooks

September 21 2010 at 3:09 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

PSTMD

Also available for free on ibooks are:

Democracy in America by de Tocqueville

Aeneid by Virgil

September 21 2010 at 2:57 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

PSTMD

As are multiple translations of the Bible for the book of Job and Ecclesiastes

September 21 2010 at 2:50 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

PSTMD

The Shakespeare readings are also available from iBooks and other free app Store sources.

September 21 2010 at 2:43 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

dugnsand

Erica - it's Robert Louis Stevenson. Not Stephenson.

September 19 2010 at 6:07 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Chris McDonald

Message to Apple from Australia - we're still waiting to be able to purchase a single book from our iBook store. 4 months; still waiting!

September 19 2010 at 6:50 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

1 reply to Chris McDonald's comment

Gilles

Don't be too impatient... If iBookstore Canada is any indication, you'll get mainly Oprah approved and five year old thrillers (besides the Classics).

September 19 2010 at 4:53 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Foxbat

L. Frank Baum with all of the Oz stories are available for free via iTunes. It has been quite enjoyable discovering the Lands of Oz and Dorothy's adventures.

September 18 2010 at 10:16 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

brian

Funny, I just heard about Flatland the other day. According to Wikipedia it partially inspired Norton Juster's "The Dot and the Line" which I love, so if you're a fan, check it out.

September 18 2010 at 6:23 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Karl

Although I have iBooks installed on my phone, I was presented with default choices of either "Stanza" (my preferred reader), or "GoodReader". Surprisingly, no iBooks option!!

September 18 2010 at 3:08 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Buzz

You would have thought that Ben Franklin were a little more like Twain, but no. I read his autobiography, but got a lot more out of a Bio book by John T. Morse Jr. written before 1898 which had a century of details and revelations percolating to the surface.

The iPad App: "Free Books" costs two bucks, but if you read all 23,469 of them, that's only $0.000085 each.

And it will take you 64 years if you read one a day.

September 18 2010 at 2:08 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply