I just began using audio books. They have been a god send, as I have had to make several 16 hour trips back to the US this winter. I have borrowed from the library once, but that does not work out for the times when I may be gone for a month or more and the ones I have bought are pricey for a one time use. I don't anticipate going through many of these in a year. What options are everyone else using? Thanks for any comments. Steve

I plow snow in the winter and really like the audio books to help stay awake. I have some on CD that I bought, these are a bit pricey but most truck stops have a trade library that you can swap them at.

The other option is to get on the net and down load books onto an MP3 format and play them that way. Lots of books free just not many "new" best seller types.

I commute to work an hour and a half each way and use audiobooks to pass the time. In Alaska, if you have a library card they can be downloaded free from the public libraries. Not sure what other states may offer, but it's FREE and you can download 10 at a time. They expire in a week or two, your choice. Haven't paid a nickel for a book yet, going on three years.

Burn library cd's to laptop hard drive, then listen from laptop. Transfer to iPod, iPhone or iPad if available. Piece o cake...

I like the Louis L'amore, and other short stories on CD when I drive. A lot of truck stops have them. The first one I bought was years ago when I was taking the kids to Disneyland. They started complaining about the stupid stories for about two minutes then they just shut up and sat quietly the whole time it was playing. Never left home without them after that. Kids are gone but they still go with me whenever I travel.

I have an Ipod and load tons of audiobooks on that....theres a website audible.com they have tons and tons of books on there...I also listen to podcasts every now and then, there are some neat ones...the aviation ones aren't half bad and there are thousands of other ones...I drive 8 hours each weekend to Maine from Mass. and I've gone through hundreds of podcasts and books....if you decide to go that route I can give you some pointers for neat aviation related listening!

steve wrote:I just began using audio books. They have been a god send, as I have had to make several 16 hour trips back to the US this winter. I have borrowed from the library once, but that does not work out for the times when I may be gone for a month or more and the ones I have bought are pricey for a one time use. I don't anticipate going through many of these in a year. What options are everyone else using? Thanks for any comments. Steve

Another vote for audible.

Thanks guys, a lot of good information, I assumed people other than over the road drivers used these. Plowing snow, long commutes would certainly qualify and keeping kids quiet on a long trip would be priceless. Tips on where to find aviation related audio would be great. Iphone or similar would be a consideration and I can see the utility of it, other than the expense of maintaining the extra services when I only use a cell phone 2-3 months out the year and shut it off the rest. I did stop at some truck stops on the way down this time (even bought some talking books there) but did not find any trade-in system like I had anticipated. I had looked at Audible, but hoped there would be a more inexpensive option, but have not ruled it out. I have never had an portable device and really am not a fan of long term use of headsets if not necessary, but I supposed there might be a way to wire one into the speaker system of my vehicle (how about the Iphone?). I suppose copying everything to CD would probably be the easiest and maybe most cost effective.

Sorry to sound so cheap, but this seemed like one of those areas I could be. Funny how we can spend bazillions on airplane stuff and not blink, but the price of a talking book seems like a big deal.

Three options that I have used for this.
1: If you have a Kindle, Sony Reader, Nook, or similar device you can download audio books from most public libraries that you have a card for. They expire in 2 weeks so you don't have to return them, and you can download more from anywhere that has internet service.
2: check out CD's from your local library and copy them. (yes, I know, this is technically illegal and VERY COMMON) .
3: there are many sites online that you can download free e-books and audio books, I personally use gutenburg.org, everything they have is uncopywrited, so a lot of it is OLD, but they have several thousand FREE books to download and it is all LEGAL .

Get the Libby app. Use your library card to access free ebooks and Audio books. I have an IPad so i can use the kindle app, it works in conjunction for free.

If I can get my hands on the LA library card that would be a score. My podunck South Carolina library system is a bit lacking in the history book section.

So is hua min the same spammer from Vietnam that posted in "a few good books", or a different one?

I have said many times, "without audio books, I would be dead." Long flights, short flights, I listen to audio books, or at least music. Nothing to listen to, the plane is down. Most flying is kind of boring, some stimulation keeps one awake.

Libraries do have a nice selection of audiobooks. You can use various services that partner with your library, like Overdrive or RB Digital. Of course they have CD's. Which Apple iTunes will digest into MP3's. When you insert an audio CD into a Mac (provided you have a CD reader, if not, they are cheap), it comes up in iTunes. Use the edit drag down to select all. You then go over to the gear symbol and drag down to Join All Tracks. This makes the CD into one big MP3, instead of a zillion little ones. The select import CD. It will happily start converting it to a file. Other refinements are, edit the title and track and disk info, by selecting Get Info. I do this and put them in a category of Books And Spoken, not Audiobooks. For some Apple reason, audiobooks category does not sequence the files in the correct order. I also number the track name by adding the disk number as a suffix. This helps me keep track. I also make a Books and Spoken Playlist to keep the books in.