Searching and purchasing books

If this is the first time you’ve worked with Google Play Books, you may not have much to see when you open the app. However, you can change that situation quickly. Open Google Play Books by clicking Play Books in the Launcher and then click the Shop Books link in the top-right corner of the window. The Google Play Bookstore loads in a new window, giving you the option to search for and purchase books.

To purchase a book, follow these steps:

1. In the search bar at the top of the Google Play Bookstore, enter the name of the book for which you’re searching. Press Enter.

   The search results populate the screen, as shown in Figure 16-1.

2. Browse through the search results to locate the desired book and click the thumbnail of the cover.

   If the book you’re looking for doesn’t appear in the search results, revise your search to use fewer words and thus expand your search results.

   You can search for books by author, title, and subject.

   After you click the image of the book cover, the book profile page loads. On this page, you can read a description of the book, read reviews, search for similar texts, and purchase the book for reading on your Chromebook.

   

3. If you’re ready to purchase the book, click the Buy button, located to the right of the book thumbnail.

   A Google Wallet window appears, as shown in Figure 16-2, asking you to confirm your purchase. If you don’t have a payment method on file, you must first add one before you can purchase the book. See Chapter 12 in the section on Google Play Music for setting up payments with Google.

   

4. Click Buy Ebook.

   The purchase is completed, and the book is added to your Google Play Books library.

Even if you don’t want to spend money, you can still add new books to your library by choosing one of the free books available in the Google Play Bookstore. The free books are mixed into Google Play, but you can get access to a list of the top free books by following these steps:

1. Click the Top Free link at the top of the Google Play Bookstore window.

   The complete Top Free Books chart loads.

2. Browse through the chart and click the thumbnail of a book you’re interested in.

   The book’s profile page loads.

3. If you want to read the book, click the Ebook Free button next to the book cover thumbnail near the top of the window.

   A Google Wallet pop-up window appears, asking you to confirm your free purchase.

4. Click Accept and Buy to complete your free purchase.

   A notification appears to confirm the addition of the free book to your library, as shown in Figure 16-3.

Previewing a book

You might be interested in a book but want to take a peek before you buy it — the way you can flip through a book in a bookstore. Google Play Books lets you do this. To preview a book, follow these steps:

1. Select a title that interests you.

   If a preview is available, the Free Sample button appears next to the price.

2. Click Free Sample.

   Google Play Books opens the book using the reader (more about that later in this chapter). You can scroll through some of the pages of the book, as in Figure 16-4. The reader tells you how many pages are available in the preview, and you can use the progress bar at the bottom to quickly scroll through the content available in the preview.

Reading in Full Screen mode

When you start reading an ebook with the Google Play Books app, you start in Full Screen mode. This means that all you see on the entire Chromebook screen are the contents of the book you are reading. To advance pages, use sideways scrolling gestures with your mouse or trackpad to turn the page forward or backward. Or, click near the right edge of the screen to go to the next page, or near the left edge of the screen to go to the previous page.

If you tap in the middle of the page, you exit Full Screen mode. Now you can see reading controls, as shown in Figure 16-5. In this mode, you can slide the little blue ball left and right to quickly move forward or backward in the book. Click the Chapters button to view the list of chapters, and click a chapter to immediately go to it. Near the upper-right corner, you can search for content in the book and change the size and color of the text, as described in the next section. Clicking the Menu button displays a list of other items you can see and the actions you can take.

Personalizing your view

While you’re reading your book, you can personalize the density of the lines of text, increase or decrease the size of the letters, and even change the typeface of the ebook text. To customize your view, follow these steps:

1. In your Google Play Books library, click the book you want to read.

   The book loads into the window.

2. Click the Aa icon in the top-right of the window. (If you don’t see it, tap the image of the book in the reader to expose the controls at the top and bottom of the window.)

   The Display Options window appears, revealing several options for customizing your ebook view, as shown in Figure 16-6.

   

3. Make changes in the menu.

   Google applies those changes to the text in real time.

4. When you’re finished making changes, click outside the Display Options window.

   The window disappears.

Using bookmarks

As you read through your ebooks, you may want to place a bookmark to remember your place. With Google Play Books, you can place multiple bookmarks so that you can quickly return to sections of a book. Place a bookmark by following these steps:

1. In your Google Play Books library, click the book you want to read.

   The book is loaded into the window.

2. Turn to a page you want to bookmark.
3. Click the menu icon in the top-right corner of the window. (Refer to Figure 16-5.)

4. Click Bookmark This Page.

   A bookmark appears on the page, as shown in Figure 16-7, indicating that the page has been bookmarked. When you’re not in Full Screen mode, a bookmark appears above the scrollbar at the bottom of the reading window.

To quickly navigate to your bookmarked pages:

1. Tap anywhere on the page to exit Full Screen mode if needed.

2. Click any of the bookmarks that appear just above the timeline, as shown in Figure 16-7.

   You’re taken immediately to the desired bookmarked page.

Viewing the definition of a word

As you’re reading, you may come to a word that you aren’t familiar with. If you’re reading the book while connected to the Internet, you can quickly see the definition of the word by Alt-clicking it or tapping the word with two fingers. A window appears, shown in Figure 16-8, containing the popular definitions of the word. Click anywhere outside of the definition window to make it disappear.

Using Alt-click or a two-finger tap, you can also highlight the word in one of several colors as you can see in Figure 16-8 (in the ebook but not the print book because it’s not in color).

Reading ebooks offline

As is the case with most of what you do on a Chromebook, all your books are stored in the cloud in your Google Play Books library. Further, if your Chromebook has enough space, Google Play Books also downloads your book to your Chromebook. If you want to read a newly purchased book offline, chances are that you’ll be able to without having to do anything!

If you are a voracious reader and have an extensive library, eventually you’ll need to make room for new ebooks. Follow these steps to remove a downloaded book from your Chromebook (note, though, that you’re not removing it from your library; you’re just no longer storing it locally on your Chromebook):

1. Open your Google Play Library.
2. Scroll to a book you want to remove from local storage on your Chromebook.
3. Click the menu icon (three little dots) near the upper-right corner of the book’s cover image.
4. Click Remove Download.

You can remove a book regardless of whether you’re online.

If you are anticipating being offline for a while (such as for a trans-Atlantic airline flight without Wi-Fi), you want to make sure that the books you want to read are stored locally — that is, on your Chromebook. Follow these steps:

1. While online, launch Google Play Books.
2. Scroll to a book you want to make available locally.

3. Click the menu icon (three little dots) near the upper-right corner of the book cover image.

   If Remove Download appears, the book is already stored locally on your Chromebook and you need do nothing.

4. If Download appears in the menu, this book is not on your Chromebook, so click Download to save a copy of your book on your Chromebook. (See Figure 16-9.)

Reading ebooks on the Google Play Books website

You don’t actually have to download the Google Play Books app to read ebooks. Instead, you can enjoy a similar experience right within the Chrome browser. To get to your library on the website, go to https://books.google.com/. Your library appears, as shown in Figure 16-10. To read an ebook, just click its image.

While reading, the display, navigation, and bookmark features are similar to how they appear in the Google Play Books app. (See Figure 16-11.)

Reading Kindle books

To read a book in your Kindle library, click its book cover image. The book opens to the first page (or, possibly, the page you last read if you were reading the book on another device). (See Figure 16-14.)

When reading your Kindle book, no reading controls appear — but they are there. To view the reading controls, move the cursor near the top or bottom of the reading window to make the controls appear, as shown in Figure 16-15.

Purchasing Kindle books

To shop for Kindle books from your Chromebook, go to your Kindle library and click the Kindle Store button near the upper-right corner of the Kindle Cloud Reader app. Doing so takes you to the Kindle Bookstore on Amazon.com, where you can search for and select titles.

When you purchase books, they appear in your Chromebook’s Kindle library.

Reading Kindle books offline

You can download Kindle books to your Chromebook to read offline. To see which books are in the cloud and which are downloaded, go to your Kindle library and click the Cloud button at the top center of the window. Your entire library of books appears. Next, click the Download button to see which ones are already on your Chromebook. To download a book that’s in the cloud only, Alt-click (or two-finger click) the book title and then click Download and Pin Book, as shown in Figure 16-16.

Later on, if you are running short on local storage space on your Chromebook, you can remove downloaded books from your Kindle library. To do so:

1. Go to your Kindle Library.
2. Select the book to remove from local storage.
3. Alt-click (or two-finger tap) the book’s image.

4. Click Remove Book.

   The book is not removed from your Kindle Library — just from your Chromebook.