WARNING! This website is no longer actively maintained. It is an archive of 2 years work by Doug Belshaw who now blogs at dougbelshaw.com...
Until Google closed the loophole, the method I demonstrated for using their Book Search to read any book online worked really well. Now I’m going to show you how to use Amazon’s ‘Search Inside’ feature for the same purpose… ![]()
1. Login to Amazon (UK) as usual.
2. Find the book that you want to read. It must have the ‘Search Inside’ feature indicated:
3. Click on the book cover to bring up the ‘Search Inside’ feature:
4. Above the front cover of the book, you’ve options to view different parts of the book. Click on ‘Table of Contents’:
5. The table of contents should come up with chapters, page numbers, etc.
6. Find the chapter, or in this case, article that you’re looking for. Note the author, title and page number at which it begins:
7. Use the search function to type in the chapter/article title, using quotation marks:
8. A list of places in the book where your search phrase appears is brought up. Find the page number of where the chapter/article you are interested in begins (in this case, p.46):
9. Click on the relevant link to the page and the beginning of the chapter or article you were looking for will be brought up:
10. You can go onto the next page by clicking the forward arrow, or by scrolling to the bottom and clicking ‘Next Page’. You’re only allowed to view 3 pages at a time, including the page you searched for.
11. Never fear, however! Simply find a phrase towards the end of the last page you are allowed to view:
12. Type this phrase into the search box, in quotation marks again:
13. Find the page which you were just on and click on the link. You should now be able to view another three pages. Repeat as necessary… ![]()
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Not wishing to be a pooper - but shouldn’t we be buying the books, or visiting the library, so that we’re (1) supporting academic research, or the particular author and (2) not breaking the law?
Ed.
I’m certainly not advocating that people should stop buying books. However, lets take the following example: you receive a reading list for one of the modules you are taking as part of a higher degree. A number of books, of which you only have to read a chapter, are not in the library. They’re about £30 to buy. This is a way to be able to do that reading…