I recently spent 4 years as an online University student. There are times when one orders a book and it takes forever to arrive. In the meantime the Professors assume you have your books and begin the class with 4 chapters of reading and 3 written assignments. Needless to say that is one way to start out a class with high levels of stress and generally freaking out about getting behind. So in one term I discover this method of learning most of what I needed to complete the assignment while I waited for my books to arrive. I share this in hopes that perhaps some of you with a limited budget can take advantage of this learning opportunity. I works like this.
Online we have "Google Books" and "Amazon Look Inside." I noticed that the preview pages of one isn't always the same preview pages in the other. AND, Amazon has a "search inside the book" feature
Ok, so... This morning. I pulled up some leather books in google books and found this one. Pretty basic stuff but we will use it as an example.
Basic Leathercrafting: All the Skills and Tools You Need to Get Started
By Elizabeth Letcavage, Bill Hollis
I looked for the same book in Amazon and sure enough it has a "Look inside" preview available. (This isn't always the case, btw)
So what I do is open the book in one window... then open the same book in another window. And flip back and forth between the two. In google I and read the title page, the acknowledgements and see the 'introduction' page as well as pages 1-7. In amazon, I can see the cover, the title page, and pages 1-6. then page 26. etc. Then I use the search Inside feature in Amazon to "search inside this book" Let's say I search for "hand stitching" It lands me on page 15. But I can scroll up 1 page to page 14, and down to page 19. On the left, I see other links to page 72, that has the word "stitch" on that page. When I click it, I can scroll up and down to pages 70-74. (not all results here will be click-able)
Ok sure it's sort of a pain... and one has to know the terms to search, but this has saved my behind while I've waited for books to arrive and when I needed a quote to put in a report. You might not be able to read all of the book, between these two screens, but it is certainly enough to understand what the book is trying to teach.
Hope this helps some of you.
P.S... I'm currently looking through
Leatherworking Handbook: A Practical Illustra… (Paperback) by Valerie Michael
:D