eBooks are a great way to read Slate. Check out these compilations of some of Slate's greatest articles, such as the annual Best of Slate collections, Ten Timeless Explainers, poetry anthologies, and much more.
PRINT
DISCUSS
E-MAIL
RSS
RECOMMEND...
Facebook
MySpace
Mixx
Digg
Reddit
del.icio.us
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Sphere
StumbleUponMost Slate eBooks are available in Microsoft Reader, HTML, and PDF formats. (Install Microsoft Reader by clicking here. The download is about 6.75 MB. Microsoft Reader requires Windows 95 or higher and Internet Explorer 4.01 with Service Pack 1 or higher.)
Slate's eBook Club Editions
February 2004: The Collected Seed
In February 2001, Slate launched "Seed," a series of articles about the Repository for Germinal Choice, a "Nobel Prize" sperm bank that was started by California industrialist Robert Graham in 1980 and closed in 1999. David Plotz wanted to find the 200-odd children conceived through the "genius sperm bank," their parents, and the men who donated the sperm for them. February's eBook Club edition is the assembled collection of articles and interviews published in the course of his search.
Price: Free
in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
January 2004: An Eye for Ads
Our download this month is a selection of 17 "Ad Report Cards," looking back with a critical eye on some of the best, the worst, and the most bizarre advertisements of the last two years. Included are the mysteries of the "Dell Dude", the lighter side of Spam, and Spike Jonze's ode to a lonely lamp.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
December 2003: The Best of Slate 2003
To assemble our Best of Slate editions we ask our writers and editors "What have you done that was good this year?" This year they responded with a fantastic list of favorites... We've gathered many of those favorites together in December's club edition; the second installment in our annual "Best of-" series.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
November 2003: Short and Sassy Assessments
Our eBook Club download for November is a collection of nine "Assessments": short, sassy biographies of five men, two women, one band, and a stuffed bear of little brain.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
October 2003: Ten Timeless Explainers, Take Two
October's download is our second collection of "Ten Timeless Explainers." Like the first edition, this eclectic Q & A covers everything from science and economics to sports and history. How does corking help a batter's swing? How do geomagnetic storms work? How much of your food is bioengineered? You'll find the answers to these questions, plus seven more, in this month's eBook Club Edition.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
September 2003: Slate Opens the Music Box
Our club download this month is a selection of ten "Music Box" articles covering subjects as diverse as Miles Davis' "missing years," Eminem's martyr complex, and the popularity of country music tribute songs. Jan Swafford writes about the creeping "Vivaldi-ization of Bach," and Fred Kaplan claims that Steely Dan is getting old.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
August 2003: The Slate Poetry Collection, Volume 2
Our August eBook Club download is Volume 2 of the Slate Poetry Collection. This anthology of 191 poems published between January 2000 and August 2003 includes Lynne McMahon's "Bliss," Yusef Komunyakaa's "Bonsai, Golden Lotus," David Gewanter 's "Traffic of Creations," Tichborne's "Elegy," and many, many more.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
July 2003: The Slate Poetry Collection, Volume 1
Our July is the first installment of the club's most ambitious project to date, the Slate Poetry Collection. Volume 1 is an anthology of over 150 poems published between 1996 and 1999, with an original introduction by Robert Pinsky. Some of the poets in this collection are well-known, like William Carlos Williams (represented by "The Turtle") and Joyce Carol Oates ("Double Portrait" and "Marooned in Dallas"), but most are relatively obscure outside the small community of poetry journals and academic writing programs. We're proud to present them to you here and in our archives and hope that you have as much fun reading this collection as we had building it.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
June 2003: Culinary Curiosities
June's club download is a collection of off-the-wall food articles, examining culinary mysteries from irradiated burgers and soda boycotts to the history of sugar and the origin of the elusive Broasted chicken. Learn to eat everything with Jeffery Steingarten's "The Omnivore," "Wok the Dog" with Will Saletan, or experience "The Joy of Truffles" with Jason Epstein, for as Chowhound Jim Leff reminds us in his "Diary," "Life is short and great chow is fleeting."
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
April 2003: Tax-Time Humor
Our download for April is a short collection of humor pieces to chase away the post-tax-time blues. We've included Seussian rhymes, sporting tongue-twisters, political poetry, rampaging squirrels, and more celebrities than you can shake a stick at.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
March 2003: Baseball!
"I think there are three things America will be known for 2,000 years from now when they study this civilization: the Constitution, jazz music, and baseball."
--Gerald Early
Last year the eBook Club celebrated the return of spring with a collection of poetry. This year we're doing it with baseball! Our March download is a selection of nine articles on America's favorite pastime, plus a look at baseball's transatlantic cousin, cricket.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
February 2003: The Collected "Dad Again"
Our February club edition is a full collection of Michael Lewis' "Dad Again" columns. These often-humorous musings on fatherhood include sibling rivalry, a camping trip in Fairyland, low-rent cartoon characters, and a firm rationalization for "wimping out."
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
January 2003: Poetry for the New Year
In January's club download, we've gathered the seven poems Slate has published during the first week of January--plus C.K. William's "Fragment", one of the first poems that appeared in Slate--for a unique blend of voices to start the year. Included in our New Year's collection are J.V. Cunningham's deceptively brief "Epigram 16," Mark Halliday's longing for home in "Parkersburg," and Eliot Khalil Wilson's "Elegy for the Saint of Letting Small Fish Go."
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
December 2002: The Annual "Best of Slate" Edition
We asked Slate's writers and editors "What have you done that was good this year?" They responded with a fantastic list of favorites, including everything from a lesson in wine spitting to the diary of a new father. We've gathered many of those favorites together in this month's club edition; an eBook substantially larger and more diverse than our usual downloads. It's the first installment of what we hope will become an annual tradition, the "Best of Slate."
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
November 2002: Getting Ready for the Holidays
Our November download is all about getting ready for the holidays. From picking the perfect tree to sampling seasonal brews, we've assembled a set of seven articles to help you make it through to New Year's. We've even included a review of fine stationery to cover all of those post-holiday thank you notes.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
October 2002: The Halloween Edition
This month we celebrate the season of ghosts, ghouls, and goblins with a special Halloween edition. Our download features Bill Barol's survey of kid-tested treats, Robert Pinsky's favorite Halloween sonnet, a look at the spooky photography of Edgar Degas, and David Edelstein's review of a modern creepy classic, 'The Blair Witch Project'.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
September 2002: A Trip to the Wine Cellar
"Wine is constant proof that God likes to see us happy"
--Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)
This month our eBook Club download takes a trip to the wine cellar, with Michael Steinberger's review of Riedel stemware, Kelly Alexander's quest for a respectable Merlot, Fareed Zakaria's ode to German wines, and Jon Cohen's dive into the "stylish" and sometimes "rubenesque" world of labels. We've also included a tribute to vermouth and a guy's guide to malt beverages just in case wine isn't quite your cup of tea.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
August 2002: Back to School
Our download this month celebrates an eagerly awaited annual event, avidly anticipated by parents everywhere: the beginning of a new school year. As students go back to class, Dahlia Lithwick offers advice to budding lawyers, Seth Stevenson dives into the shady world of "pre-manufactured" term papers, Peter Scheer ponders the socialist economics of college tuition, and Drew Hindes offers a teacher's point of view.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
July 2002: Slate Goes Shopping
If you've ever wondered about those ab-trainers on late-night television, or the vegetarian "sausage" in your grocer's freezer, then this month's eBook Club download is for you! From paper towels and toothbrushes to chocolate bars and nicotine gum, our collection of "Shopping" columns dishes out the good, the bad, and the ugly on nine different types of consumer products.
The verdict? Faux sausage … pretty good; ab-trainers … definitely not ready for prime time.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
June 2002: Meet the Presidents
In reply to the Leesburg Republicans in 1809, Thomas Jefferson wrote, "That there should be a contrariety of opinions respecting public agents and their measures ... is ever to be expected among free men." No other public agent in America seems to bring out more differences of opinion than the occupant of the Oval Office. In this month's eBook Club edition we've brought together a collection of seven articles featuring former U.S. presidents who have caused their share of "contrariety"—including Thomas Jefferson himself.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
May 2002: Ten Timeless Explainers
"Explainer" is a regular feature in Slate, answering readers' questions about all sorts of subjects in the news. For this month's club download we've assembled 10 of the very best Explainer columns. From the origin of papal bulls to the political status of Antarctica, we hope they'll be an interesting—and informative—start to your summer reading.
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
April 2002: Spring Poetry
Our first club edition is a collection of spring poetry that includes Karl Kirchwey's poetic landscape "Roman Park, Noon," W.S. Merwin's "First Sight," and Rosanna Warren's delightfully lyrical "Day Lilies."
Price: Free in MS-Reader format.
in HTML format.
in PDF format.
Other Slate eBooks
1. Slate's Greatest Hits: The Best of Our First Five Years
When it launched on June 24, 1996, Slate set out to publish smart, witty, provocative journalism that uses the Web inventively. We've changed a lot since then, but we like to think we're still doing just that. It is in this spirit that we offer Slate's Greatest Hits: The Best of Our First Five Years, a collection of 30 articles, including:
- Dispatches From the1997 Presidential Inauguration, by Karenna Gore
- "Internet Envy," by Michael Kinsley
- "Go ahead—sleep with your kids," by Robert Wright
- "Martin Scorsese: The vicar of cinema," by A.O. Scott
- The Good Word: "Airline English—Why flight attendants talk like that," by Cullen Murphy
Plus much more from your favorite Slate writers.
Price: $2.95
Click on the button to buy and download Slate's Greatest Hits from bn.com.
2. The Magic of Reading
"How can you have a paperless office, when reading on the computer screen is so awful? We are about to break through that barrier. And everything will change when we do." In this 1999 white paper, Microsoft researcher Bill Hill—who has spent more than 15 years studying typography and reading—lays out the ideas that led to the creation of the Microsoft Reader platform for electronic books. But Hill does more than that: He also explains why we read, how we read, and how we can revolutionize the act of reading on a computer screen. (Note: The Magic of Reading was written in 1999, which is why it refers to various technologies that didn't exist at the time but have since been developed. It also contains some graphics that look best when viewed on a desktop or laptop PC.)
Price: Free.
3. George W. Bushisms, The Slate Book of The Accidental Wit and Wisdom of Our 43rd President
Each week, Slate's Chief Political Correspondent Jacob Weisberg collects quotes from George W. Bush, such as, "I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family," and "It is clearly a budget. It's got a lot of numbers in it." We've collected the best tidbits into a book. Download a free sample below, or click here to buy the paperback book.
Price: Free excerpt.
4. The Road to Chadville: Campaign 2000 as Seen From Cyberspace
In July 1999, Slate Chief Political Correspondent Jacob Weisberg filed his first dispatch from the 2000 presidential campaign trail: "Styles of Stiff," about the stylistic differences between Bill Bradley (whom he called "merely boring") and Al Gore ("actually a bore"). Over the next 18 months Weisberg followed Democrats, Republicans, Greens, and Reformers around the country, judging their stump speeches, refereeing their debates, and calling their bluffs—all the way to Florida and the U.S. Supreme Court. The Road to Chadville is a collection of his 154 articles, which were originally posted in Slate's "Ballot Box" department and includes an introduction by Slate editor Michael Kinsley.
Price: Free.
5. Excerpts From the Slate Diaries
In November 2000, Slate published our first paper book, The Slate Diaries, an anthology of the weekly journals that have run in the magazine for the past four years. Sadly, printing and distribution costs prevent us from giving the paperback version away free. But you can read an excerpt right now, for no charge, on your desktop, laptop, or Pocket PC computer. Simply follow the instructions below to read Diaries from Karenna Gore Schiff, daughter of the former vice president; radio host Ira Glass; school nurse Leslie Carr; and NYPD detective Lucas Miller; as well as an eBook-only introduction by our "Diary" editor. If you'd like to order the paperback version or see who else is in the book, click here.
Price: Free.
6. Sons: George W. Bush and Al Gore
Our first electronic book, Sons, contains the two most influential and talked-about articles of the campaign season: "The Redemption" and "Gore Without a Script." These incisive profiles—of George W. Bush and Al Gore, respectively—were written by Nicholas Lemann and originally appeared in The New Yorker earlier this year.
Price: Free.
What It Will Cost You To Deny Illegal Immigrants Health Insurance
Stupid Drug Story of the Week: NBC's Today Show Discovers Huffing
Can the Government Call God Jesus? What About Allah?
How Twilight Made Goth Fashion Mainstream
Is Disney's The Suite Life Making Your Child Into an Evil Lothario?
The Blind Side: Illegal Use of Sandra Bullock
