Why we're providing disk space and bandwidth
Baen Books have been offering free books for many years now. They're available both online and through CDs included in first edition hardbacks of their major authors, and we're talking MAJOR authors: Andre Norton, Mercedes Lackey, SM Stirling, David Weber, David Drake, A.E. Van Vogt, Eric Flint, John Ringo, Keith Laumer, and many more! Baen recognizes that publicity spurs sales, and by becoming familiar with an author's prior work that you're more likely to buy their new work.
I agree absolutely. I bought the first Honor Harrington book, On Basilisk Station, in a $1.99 special edition at a Tucson convention many years ago. I was not familiar with David Weber at that time, but I have since bought every Harrington book as soon as I could lay hands on it. In fact, I am re-reading the entire series right now in electronic format on my Dell Axim because (a) my dead tree editions are locked in storage a hundred miles away, and (b) I'm about to have a second operation for Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and reading paperbacks is not easy for me right now (3/2009).
So I'm providing zipped copies of these CDs in appreciation for Baen making this material available (I'm also going to try to host a Project Guttenberg mirror). Feel free to download whatever you like, there's a total of 4 gig of material as of March, 2009. I think a disc or two is released every year, and I intend to upload new discs as they become available. The only restriction is the one passed on from Baen: feel free to post them online or burn copies of these discs and give them to friends, but you cannot sell them. Spreading good, free fiction is very good for your karma, buying the Baen books that contain them is even better.
Since I have pretty much unlimited storage space and bandwidth I thought hosting them would be down right neighborly.
The list!
There are 18(!) discs available totalling around 4 gigabytes. Click on them to download. I've included a rough count as to about how many stories are included in each zip, but there are a large number of duplicates between discs. Some of the discs also have all sorts of bonus material such as author's web sites, audio books, etc.
| Disc Title | Size in Meg |
Number of Stories |
Story List? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baen01-HonorverseCD.zip | 183 |
38 |
|
| Baen02-AldenataCD.zip | 402 |
26 |
|
| Baen03-SlammersCD.zip | 415 |
28 |
|
| Baen04-DragonsCD.zip | 517 |
23 |
|
| Baen05-ScepteredIsleCD.zip | 62 |
21 |
|
| Baen06-WindRiderCD.zip | 228 |
52 |
|
| Baen06B-SaganamiCD.zip | 110 |
27 |
|
| Baen07-LookingGlassCD.zip | 147 |
16 |
|
| Baen08-GhostCD.zip | 154 |
19 |
|
| Baen09-AtAllCostsCD.zip | 145 |
33 |
|
| Baen11-UntotheBreachCD.zip | 181 |
26 |
|
| Baen12-HellHathNoFuryCD.zip | 176 |
40 |
|
| Baen13-The Best of Jim Baen's UniverseCD.zip | 123 |
? |
|
| Baen13-TheBalticWarCD.zip | 186 |
50 |
|
| Baen15-WhentheTideRisesCD.zip | 468 |
41 |
|
| Baen16-ClawsThatCatchCD.zip | 272 |
37 |
|
| Baen17-StormfromtheShadowsCD.zip | 247 |
38 |
No |
| BaenP04-TheSpiderCD.zip | 22 |
3 |
Please note that there are two Disc 6 and 13, and no Disc 10 or 14. That's the way that Baen numbered the releases, I have no control over that.