Can anyone recommend me some good copyright-expired books or fan-fiction?

[JoJo]

Good afternoon Escapists, I come to you today with a request but first for some background. I intend to do some travelling later this year and have decided now would be the perfect time to drop some money on a Kindle. One of my house-mates has one and when I tried it, it seemed really neat. However, at-least initially I don't want to spend too much on books for it so here's where you come in.

What I'm looking for is some free novels or books I can download legally. In other words, mostly either copyright-expired books or fan-fiction, either will do if they are good enough. I have quite wide-ranging tastes so feel free to recommend anything, but if you want some pointers then I've listed some of my tastes below:

What I do like:

-Books with a historical or political background
-Parent or sibling relationships
-Fantasy or Sci-fi
-East Asian settings

What I don't like:

-Books primarily about romance or sport (a sub-plot of either is fine)
-Biographies
-My Immortal

Over to you, Escapids!

 

[JoJo]

I dunno much about fanfiction but for a book how about Tales of Genji? That's one of the world's oldest novels so it must be out of copyright by now, and it's in historical Japan so that covers two of your good points. It's got romance but if you're into history then there'll be lots to keep your interested since it's massively long. Just make sure you pick a translation you like as there's several quite different ones.

Thanks, I'll check it out!

OT: Okay, this thread has got far less attention than I expected, is there really nothing (apart from Dr K) that anyone can recommend?

 

[Axolotl]

I'm pretty sure A Princess of Mars is public domain now, with the film coming out now might be a good time to read it.

Frankenstein, Dracula and most of Lovecraft are public domain if you like horror. I think We is as well, it's the prototype for distopian sci-fi (it was a big inspiration for 1984). I think you can get Voltaire's stories free on a kindle and I'd highly reccomend those (although try to get a version with notes to explain all the refrences he makes). Beyond that, Vathek maybe if you like fantasy?

 

[Esotera]

Firstly I'll recommend The Hacker Crackdown [http://www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html], because it's one of the best non-fiction books I've ever read, and whilst it isn't technically copyright-expired, the author lets you read it all online.

Secondly, have you tried Project Gutenberg [http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page]? They have a whole lot of stuff there. Otherwise there's plenty of unpublished scifi out there, it just requires a fair amount of googling, maybe with the advanced search function. I prefer reading books in physical form so don't know that much about this sort of thing.

 

[Dargocitfer]

I second the recommendation for Project Gutenberg. They have Kindle format books available right on the site, so you can just surf to the book page, and download it right there!

As for some ideas for specific books, how about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? All of the Sherlock Holmes books are on Project Gutenberg.

If you surf around, there is a ton of great stuff there!

 

[FalloutJack]

Mostly, I'm not one for fanfiction, but my girlfriend showed me a long-standing tale of Evangelion called "Nobody Dies", and it's drop dead hilarious.

 

[Quaxar]

All US books copyrighted before 1923 are now public domain for example.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

Look for the classics. Dickens, maybe Shakespeare, Doyle, Dahl (?), Lovecraft, Verne, etc.

I highly suggest Lovecraft and Verne.