Audible.com

So, I was listening to This American Life the other day. It's a great podcast, but that's not what I am going to talk about. At the end of the episode, they mentioned that if you go to audible.com/american, you can sign up for an audible account and get a free audiobook. I have been trying to find ways to fill my time at work, so I did this. You get a 14 day trial and 1 credit with which to get a book. After the two weeks are up, they charge you $15, unless you cancel beforehand. When you go to cancel however, they attempt to keep you by offering better deals.

For example, when you are canceling your membership, they ask your for a reason. If you indicate that you did not like what you got, they will give you another credit with which to purchase a book (and don't be tricked, it is for any book. They just show you a list of customer favorites). The next time you go to cancel, I think no matter what you say, they will offer you a 50% price reduction for the first 3 months (which makes it $7.50 per month for the one book a month plan).

The secret is that you can make one audible account per credit card and email address (though the email address can be fake so long as you remember the login information). I currently have 3 cards and a bunch of email addresses, so last night I downloaded 6 books from Audible. I could have gotten 7, but it took me a bit of tinkering to figure out all the tricks. I am going to keep my subscription for at least a few months so that I won't feel guilty about getting all these books, but for now it's great.

The list of books I purchased is:
Bossypants by Tina Fey (which I actually listened to in its entirety on Wednesday)
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Hemingway
Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
Matterhorn by Karl Merlantes
The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt by Edmund Morris and
A Game of Thrones Book 1 by George R. R. Martin (which I knew nothing about until all this tv series hype)

The trick to getting 2x+1 books for $7.50 (where x is your number of credit cards and email addresses) is to sign up for the trial with each and get a book. Then go to cancel and say you didn't like the book, get another book. Then cancel all but one. On the last account, accept the 50% price reduction for the first three months and you will immediately be charged and given another credit for a book.

Alternatively, you could get two free books for each credit card + email address you have if you don't want to sign up for a subscription. Also, this might only work if you are putting your books on a device through iTunes. That is what I used.

Even if you don't want to do all this rule bending to acquire a bunch of books, you should at least go and get the one free book they offer to everyone.