InterLibrary Loan: ILL Alternatives

As an alternative to InterLibrary Loan or buying the resources outright, try these free online resources and Powell Library Services.

Internet Archive <archive.org>: A non-profit library of millions of free books, movies, software, music, websites, and more. The Internet Archive and participating libraries have selected digitized books from their collections that are available to be borrowed by one patron at a time from anywhere in the world for free through Controlled Digital Lending.  These books are available in BookReader format and usually in PDF and ePub formats. You can choose which format you prefer. Also, any book that you can borrow from Open Library is also available in audio form. Click the "listen" button next to the "borrow" button. LibriVox has books narrated by volunteers. If a book is available on LibriVox you'll see the link listed under ID Numbers. To borrow books through Open Library, follow these steps:

1. Sign up for an Open Library account
2. Find a book to borrow
3. If a BookReader edition is available, you can read it instantly online by clicking the "Read in Browser" link. You're done!
4. Borrowing books in other formats will require
   • Adobe Digital Editions or ebook software that works with Adobe authentication. You can read this FAQ entry for information on other ebook software.
   • An Adobe.com account which you can get here
5. Once Adobe Digital Editions or other ebook reader is downloaded, installed and registered, click the download link for the title on Open Library to download an EPUB or PDF.
6. For more information on borrowing books through Open Library see these FAQs

Open Access Resources: Open Access (OA) is free access to information and unrestricted us of electronic resources. Open access can be applied to all forms of published research output, including peer reviewed and non-peer reviewed academic journal articles, conference papers, theses, book chapters, monographs, research reports and images. To find OA resources, try these:

1. DOAB - Directory of Open Access Books
2. DOAJ - Directory of Open Access Journals
3. OA journals published/hosted by libraries 
4. Publishers of OA books
5. Selected list of peer reviewed OA resources. 

Book Scanning Service for selected pages or chapters from books held by the Robert L. Powell Library.

Controlled Digital Lending Service which digitizes print books for patrons in a “lend like print” fashion. Through CDL, the Powell Library uses technical controls to prevent users from redistributing or copying the digitized version. This ensure a consistent “owned-to-loaned” ratio, meaning the library circulates the exact number of copies of a specific title it owns, regardless of format

Last updated June 2022.