Apps, children’s book publishers offer Read an E-Book Week specials

During 2010 Read an E-Book Week, scheduled for March 7-13, dozens of booksellers and publishers will offer free downloads of electronic titles. In anticipation of the event, founder Rita Y. Toews told Relaxnews about some of the new and notable offers that have been added the to the website's E-Book Store.

As Relaxnews previously reported, 2010 Read an E-Book Week participants include Kobo Books, which carries thousands of major titles (the code Read2010 will get you one free e-book); Smashwords, a platform for independent authors and publishers (hundreds of free titles will be available); and sources for comics, fitness books, and children's literature.

Among recently added participants:

- The Aldiko e-reader application for Android phones will offer a special catalog of books in honor of the event.

- Sylvan Dell Publishing - which publishes "beautifully illustrated e-books with an educational value," according to Toews - will offer a free download of Pandas' Earthquake Escape.

- QBook, an application for the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad that offers narrated, interactive children's books, will give away a download of its title Sebastian's Tail. (See a demo at http://ebookweek.com/QBook.html.)

- Romance author Nara Malone will draw a name each day to receive a 1GB flash drive loaded with a mini e-book library.

- Online curriculum provider CurrClick will give away a Nook e-book reader to the winner of its Twitter contest.

The annual Read an E-Book Week was created in 2003 to promote the advantages of reading electronically. According to Toews, the Read an E-Book Week website - which gathers an array of information about e-books and e-readers - has welcomed visitors from Beirut, the Netherlands, Germany, Ghana, Kenya, and Latvia in the time leading up to the 2010 event.

To see all available offers, visit http://ebookweek.com/ebook_store.html.