Google’s Book Search January 3, 2007

I wanted today to offer a review of sorts regarding Google’s new Book Search (currently in Beta). First, I must mention that for me ebooks are a wonderful.  Being a bookworm (books are the one thing I constantly try to hold onto), I do love the smell of the paper and ink.  I truly enjoy that musty smell one finds with a really old book. I also love imagining who had read and touched the pages before me.  What was the history of that book from author conception to the reader’s eyes?  For example, I recently got an older Kenneth Burke book from the library and while looking for a particular quote I knew would be in there, a pressed flower fell out onto the floor.  I made a book mark out of the pressed flower—somehow it made me feel good.  But the truth is, ebooks are wonderful.  I owned the first Rocket Reader

 

(NuvoMedia) in Grad school and loved it, absolutely loved it.  I found it versatile (I could also sink my own documents to it, as well as free ebooks I found at Project Gutenberg. I could add notes and bookmarks).  I read my first Dan Brown book for under two dollars, Angels and Demons, before he was discovered by the world.  Then I owned the RCA ebook and found that one less versatile, I had to update it over a phone line and such, plus there were lovely restrictions on the books, on book formats, and the books started to get more expensive.One thing before I get to Google’s new Book Search, I think it is horrible that ebooks are now becoming just as expensive as regular books.  I don’t get it.  Technically, they should be cheaper because you aren’t paying for printing costs, paper costs and binding costs.  Further, in order to create a paper book, you first need an “electronic” version—thus, the cost, in the end, should be cheaper.  Yet I am finding that this is no longer so, and it is a shame because if ebooks were really cheaper, more people might be using and reading them and we could save a few trees in the process.  Further, there are too many “exclusive” formats now, with each company coming up with their own format that can only work on their own product.  The fact that ebooks are not versatile enough to read on any type of reader is a drawback and one that has now stopped me from being a regular ebook reader.  But I digress.

One great thing about ebooks is that you can search them for a keyword or phrase.  As I am an academic type, this rocks.  And it was how I accidentally came across Google Book Search.    Google states on their website that Google Book Search offers you the ability to “search the full text of books to find the ones that interest you and learn where to buy or borrow them.”  For some books, the one’s where the copyright has expired or the ones where the publisher has given permission, you can read and search the entire text.  For books without copyrights, you can actually download (PDF) and print the book if you wish.  For other books, such as popular ones!, there may only be a “Limited Preview,” a “Snipped View,” or a “No Preview Available” option.  Largely, I found that most books offered a limited preview with a fairly large area of search possibilities (meaning that only a few pages here and there were blocked from viewing).  Finally, when viewing the book, to the right side of your computer screen, you find links to where you can buy the books or libraries that happen to carry the books. 

The fact that libraries are included was particularly nice as, for folks like me; I often find I run out of money to spend on books.  Writing a dissertation, I am buying a lot of books, but as our budget is not allowing me to buy all the books I need—I am finding the library a beautiful place.  Google’s new service opens the door to many possibilities.  Not only can I spend more time with a book, reading it and looking over the contents, before I buy it or check it out, it also aids in the process of finding those hard to find quotes in older books missing an index.  This is appealing to me.  For example, I had checked out, read, and taken extensive notes on Kenneth Burke’s Philosophy of Literary Form.   But yesterday I found I needed a note on what makes a tragedy that I had not taken down specifically.  I was doing a search, “Burke on tragedy,” and found the book I needed on Google Book Search.  It found my quote for me, and I was delighted.  I also had the info I needed to be able to cite the quote correctly.  This could have been a huge problem for me involving getting the book retransferred to my branch at the library again, and then checking out the book, and then going through the whole book again to find the quote.  In this case, Google’s Book Search did the foot work for me.So, I applaud Google’s effort here and I also will end by offering a list of where you can get free ebooks or check out ebooks to read:

Gutenberg 

University of Virginia Library’s Etext Center

The Net Library

And, of course, Google Book Search