I LOVE to read. I read while traveling, waiting for appointments, while working out on the treadmill, while keeping my son company while he vests… I always carried books with me and for the past year and a half my Kindle has kept me entertained. Earlier this year I discovered an independent/self published author and went in search of more of her books and found a number of them on a website called http://www.textnovel.com/home.php

The site was intended for authors and readers to utilize cell phones and computers to read and write fiction. Textnovel runs contests for fiction writers, allowing them to demonstrate the market potential of their work through its unique serial publication and voting format.

Waiting for an appointment – whip out your cell phone and read a serialized novel for free. While I don’t have a smart phone, I have used the site via my desktop and iPad. Only issue I’ve had is when there are other individuals in the household who want to use the IPad to play games or watch netflicks, so my reading was interrupted and I had to page through book, which fortunately I had bookmarked, to locate where I’d left off.

Enter http://emobo.org/ an app designed to be used to access the textnovels via the iPad or a cell phone, similar to Ibook or the Kindle app. And the best part – the books are free!

My only issue so far is unlike the textnovel site, there isn’t the ability to search on eMobo by author. You either have to search by genre or title. I’ve solved that issue by going checking the author’s page on the textnovel site and noting items to read.

While Textnovel and eMobo aren’t going to replace my Kindle, I view it as being another tool in my reading toolbox.

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/emobo/id509968854?ls=1&mt=8