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I love to read. I don’t read as often as I would like and it takes me forever to finish a book, but I love to read. I also feel it’s important to state that I prefer reading actual books that I can hold, smell and feel. However, at this stage of my life, I’ve learned that reading on my Kindle reader is as lot more convenient. A few years ago I discovered Overdrive. Since then, I’ve thought that everyone knows about Overdrive but I find that I’m frequently sharing how awesome it is with friends and family who have never heard of it! Overdrive is an online library that is connected with your library card. If you have a library card and a tablet to read on (I have a Kindle), you can use Overdrive for free and read hundreds of thousands of books for free! The books available to read and audiobooks available on Overdrive are the latest books that are released, top sellers as well as countless of older popular books. To get started and connect your library card to Overdrive, head HERE and follow the steps listed.

Once you have created an Overdrive account and connect it to your Kindle, Nook, apple device, etc, you will want to start borrowing books. Each book you can borrow for 2 weeks. After the 2 weeks, if there is not a wait list waiting for your book, you will have the option to extend your borrow period for another 2 weeks. Keep reading below though because I’ve found a workaround for people like me who need more than 2 weeks to finish a book!

I use a Kindle Reader much like this one. My Kindle is a few years old so I don’t have the backlight (I wish it did) but it works perfectly for Overdrive and I use it all the time. It also holds its battery life for very long so I don’t have to constantly charge it. I think I currently have 30 books downloaded on it and I could probably download another 100+ books on it. The memory is awesome.

If there is a book that you want to read that already has a wait list, you can put it “On Hold”. Overdrive will keep you updated as to how long you should have to wait to be able to borrow the book. You are able to Hold (reserve) 7 ebooks/audiobooks at a time. You are able to borrow 10 eBooks/audiobooks at a time. If you are looking for book ideas, below are some books I’ve read during the past year. Some of the books are heavy while others are lighter.

All You Can Ever Know: A Memoir by Nicole Chung
Something in the Water by Catherine Steadman
The Other Woman by Sandie Jones
Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingale
An American Marriage by Tayari Jones
Into the Water by Paula Hawkins
The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman
Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue
The Way Life Should Be by Christina Baker Kline
Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline
We Were Liars by e. Lockhart
Into the Water by Paula Hawkins
Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell

Here’s how I recommend you use your tablet. If you have a tablet that you use only for reading eBooks like me, borrow 10 books on your Overdrive account. Once you have downloaded the 10 books (if you have a Kindle, you will download them through your Amazon account - it’s entirely free but you will need Amazon to get the book onto your Kindle), put your tablet on airplane mode. This will make it so that your tablet does not check for updates EVER until you take your tablet off airplane mode. This will also allow you to TAKE AS LONG AS YOU NEED to read your books. If your tablet is on regular mode, after two weeks, the book will disappear so you have to be very diligent to make sure you finish it in time (especially if there is a wait list on the book since you won’t be able to renew it). What I love is that there are no late fees. Once your two weeks are over, the book just disappears. **unless you keep your tablet on airplane mode!

So, I like to borrow 10 books, download them on my Kindle, put my tablet on airplane mode and then read all of the books before downloading more. Meanwhile, I will use my Overdrive account to put popular books on Hold. The most popular books on Overdrive have wait lists of 6+ months. So I will make sure that my account has all of my holds filled while I’m reading the previously downloaded books that I have on my tablet. If I find that I need more time to read my books before borrowing the books on hold, I can extend the hold up to 180 days. I find that by the time I’m ready to download more books, all of my holds are available and I can download all of them within a couple weeks. I then start the process again. I download all of the new books, put more books on hold and start reading new books.

If you are looking for a way to read popular books for free, you need to get a library card and begin using Overdrive. It’s user friendly and an awesome way to read as many books as you want throughout the year without worrying about purchasing the book OR having to deal with late fees if you take longer than 2 weeks to read!