E-Books

Considering a Library E-Book for Your Class?

Please make use of Library e-books for course reading and assignments! ...but with a few caveats:

• Many Library e-books are "single-user" -- they can only be read/used by one student at a time. Unless your class is exceptionally small, your students will find it difficult to complete the readings, as they will all be trying to read the book at once! For more information, see the Single User E-Books page in this guide.
• The Library does NOT have permanent access to all e-books in the catalog.  With some of our major e-book packages, titles move in and out of the collection frequently. We may have an e-book when you put together the reading list, but lose access to the book by the time the reading is assigned.
• "Course Reserves Information for Faculty" has more information on assigning Library books, including a link to the Book Reserve Form for both print and e-books assigned in class.

Linking to Library E-Books in Canvas or Webpages

• Use the permalink in HoyaSearch to generate a reliable URL:
• Copy the permalink to the Clipboard by using the green "Copy the Permalink" button, or selecting the link and copying.
• Insert the permalink as a Canvas External Link. For more information, see How do I create hyperlinks to external URLs? in the Canvas documentation.

Will the Library purchase e-books for classes? Scan print books from the Library's collections?

See Course Reserves for Faculty for more information on these topics. The answer often depends on the title and how much of the book is assigned for student reading. 

E-books may not be available for library purchase. Many popular bestsellers (for example) are available for personal e-readers, but cannot be purchased by libraries (as an e-book). Also, some e-book publishers don't do single-title purchasing for libraries, or impose other restrictions that make Library use impossible.