A Guide to Filling up Your Kindle, Nook, or E-Reader

*Originally published on 2/20/12


E-Readers are capable of holding hundreds of books (over a thousand if I'm not mistaken) in the palm of your hands. Even for the avid reader, that is a lot of books. Of course, you can actually accrue other content such as magazines and newspapers. The newer models have other features, but for the purpose of this article we'll just be sticking with text-based content.

Now, obviously, the first thing that comes to mind when filling up an E-reading device is books, but you need to go a bit further than that. Sure, if you're rich, you can just purchase a ton of random books and be done with it, but for most of us, we have to pick and choose. Before we begin, it has been brought to my attention that a lot of people actually don't want to fill up their e-reading device. If such is the case, you can still follow these tips to get new and interesting content, but simply follow them to a lesser degree so as to keep more space available for future purchases.

If you're a fan, I would suggest putting a lot of emphasis on fantasy novels. Each book seems to be a door-stopper in and of it self. As there is more text, it stands to reason that the file will be larger. This means that you will have to purchase fewer books before the internal drive is filled.

More than that though, fantasy also tends to be spread across multiple books into 10-12 volume series. Add to that the wide array of fantasy series out there and you can eat up a lot of space in no time.

If fantasy isn't your thing, don't worry; you still have options. Classic literature is also a great resource. While not every work is as thick as an entry in a fantasy series, the books do tend to be rather cheap. Heck, I've bought several books are outright free. I don't know about you, but I like free things. I downloaded War and Peace simply because it was free. Will I ever read it? I don't know, but I didn't pay anything for it, so who cares? This also helps add a level of "sophistication" to your collection, possibly making for a conversation piece.

One of the great things about the E-reader is that it has allowed up and coming writers to get their work out to the public. These works are also a great way to fill up space. Much like the classics, these tend to be extremely inexpensive (usually about 1 to 2 bucks) and you may find an author working on an ongoing series, giving you more material. You can also take pleasure in the fact that you are helping a young up and comer find his or her footing.

E-Readers also allow you to get the latest issues of newspapers and magazines. While these could eat up space over time, I tend to avoid them. Pardon the pun, but those don't exactly have much of a shelf life. Maybe it's just my own sensibilities, but I'd rather use that space on works that have a re-readability to them, as opposed to just perusing it once and being done with it forever.

Filling up an E-reading device is no simple task, but if you target your searches properly, you can find enough worthwhile content to fill it to the brim.