The Boy is 8 and we simply can’t keep up with his book reading. Any book we buy is finished in 24 hours and we’re always maxed out on library cards.

So I’m wondering whether there’s an e-book solution to our needs. What I’d like is the following (though I’m sure I won’t be able to tick all the boxes):

– usable on an e-ink reader so he’s not staring at a backlit screen
– allows him to choose age-appropriate books at will without me having to police it
– monthly subscription rather than per-book pricing

Actually that’s probably about it. I know Kindle Unlimited ticks the first and third boxes, but I assume not the second.

Anyone in the same boat? What works for you?

Not in the same boat – my six year old is not a fan of reading, unfortunately 🙁 – but I’m looking at buying myself an e-reader. It seems that some non-Kindle ones allow you to borrow e-books from your local library. As i understand it you just check them out and back in online via the device, so that would solve the issue of maxing out library cards, and should give you a pretty good range of books to choose from. Not sure it’d solve the age-appropriate bit though.

Both Jr Stoner’s eat books. They both enjoy series (prob having mentally invested in characters and a world they like to then just get stuck into the stories) so I tend to buy series collections on ebay s/h.

Even if it means getting the first one again, buying 3, 4 or even 10 books from a series for £5-10 saves a fortune.

“Amazon Fire for Kids”

Works on normal e-reader Kindles as well as the tablet versions. We have a Prime sub so 1.99 keeps my 8 year old in as much as he can read.

Ah. For some reason it hadn’t occurred to me that Kids Unlimited would work on the e-readers. That might be ideal (we already have Prime and the kids have Kindle Fires).

I’m not sure I want Unlimited apps and videos (having previously ended up with an Unlimited trial that I didn’t even request, good old tricksy Amazon) but presumably I could set up a separate child account for the e-reader? ie so that only books were unlimited?

Overdrive app allows borrowing from the library on a tablet if you wish to cut down on trips to the library OP.

The Kindle e-readers only support books, so that’s all you get. My lad’s is locked down on a child account, so he can get any age-appropriate book he wants as part of the sub, but can’t access the general store or actually buy anything.

Thanks. From browsing the Unlimited book selection it looks like a load of low-rent guff like “diary of a wimpy minecraft something something popular search term”. Is the content actually any good?

Also I see they have The Omen in the 5-8 year olds category…!

I don’t know what the unlimited content is like for children – but for adults it’s pretty poor. I’ve had a couple of free trials, and have struggled to find anything I wanted to read. It’s nothing like Spotify for music.

Thanks. From browsing the Unlimited book selection it looks like a load of low-rent guff like “diary of a wimpy minecraft something something popular search term”. Is the content actually any good?

Also I see they have The Omen in the 5-8 year olds category…!

I wish our online library was as good as yours!

We just go to EBay, and push him to longer, bigger boks that stretch him – my experience was that a lot of series books (Beast Quest etc.) were being inhaled in a day even when he was younger, so we directed him toward carefully curated ‘young adult’ reads which would present a challenge. Also means you only have to source a book or two a month, and can reBay the others (if you can bear to sell books, I struggle wit that). Currently working through the Mortal Engines quartet.. if I get really stuck I’ll just push him on to the Wheel of Time series 😯

A lot of libraries offer ebook loans now.
Our local authority library uses the Library2Go Overdrive system, so you can borrow EPUB ebooks. I got old secondhand Kindles from Ebay for my kids, and use the free “Calibre” software to convert the borrowed EPUB books into Kindle format (easy to do with a couple of clicks). With a non Kindle device, I think you can just load the EPUBs directly.