Lower Macungie Library Will Offer eBooks

Okay, it’s official… sort of! We’ve received word that the Carbon Lehigh Downloadable Library (OverDrive) site is scheduled to go live NEXT WEEK, the week of January 2 … we just don’t know for sure which day :) If you want to know as soon as the site is live (and how to access it), make sure you follow us on Facebook. But in the meantime, a few announcements about this exciting new offering!

For those of you asking OverWhat? OverDrive is a platform for public libraries to offer eBooks and eAudiobooks to patrons. So, for all of you who own some type of e-reader, or even have a tablet, smartphone or iPod touch, you will be able to borrow eBooks for FREE. You could even read them from your computer, if you really wanted to. We know there are going to be a lot of questions on how you do it, but here’s the basics…

If you already have a device you’d like to use or plan on getting one in the future, here is a list of compatible devices. When our website goes live, there will be TONS of help information available. OverDrive’s developers made it pretty easy on you… their Help is straightforward and easy to understand and it’ll make more sense when the site’s up. In the future, if we seem to be getting a lot of the same questions from users, we’ll post a regular “FAQ” on our website to answer some of the repeat questions.

You will have to use your home library to access the Carbon Lehigh Downloadable Library site. There is a drop-down that lets you pick a library, and you’ll have to choose your home library. Since this is a consortium, don’t worry, we all have access to the same collection. If you’re a Lower Macungie Library home patron, you’ll enter your full barcode number and then your 4 digit on the CLDL site. It’s the same information you use to log into your account on our website. If you don’t know what your pin is, go here for more information.

Due to the fact that we have a base collection at this time, you will be allowed to check out 2 items at a time and place 2 holds at a time. So if one of your holds becomes available, and your hold will expire before one of your checkouts, you’ll have to return an item in order to check out the hold. Hopefully, as the collection size grows, we’ll be able to bump that up a bit.

We hope you’re as excited as we are for this new collection!