Queen Anne Books has been one of the smartest bookstores in town for a while now: Not only are they selling e-books in partnership with Google Books—a few other bookstores in Seattle are doing the same—they're happy to help customers learn how to use e-readers and advise them on which e-readers to buy. Which is to say: They're the most evangelical about making sure their customers continue to read, no matter what format they choose. As far as I'm concerned, that's the sign of a great bookstore.

Today, tomorrow, and Saturday, in partnership with Unbridled Books, Queen Anne Books will be selling 25 e-books for 25 cents each. It's a great way to familiarize yourself with Google Books, and it's a neat promotion for one of the strongest independent presses in the business today.

I talked with Lillian at Queen Anne Books about which of these sale books she'd recommend. Without missing a beat, she suggested The Green Age of Asher Witherow, a novel about a boom-and-bust period in a California coal mining town. Song of the Crow, she said, is a "very weird book" by a local author "about being a crow." Lillian said a coworker of hers loved The Pirate’s Daughter (about Errol Flynn's illegitimate daughter) and that the new book by
Panopticon author David Bajo, Coffins of Little Hope, is getting a lot of rave reviews from her customers, making this a ridiculously affordable way to look into his backlist. I'm excited about reading Hick, a road-trip novel about a teenager who sets off for Las Vegas, becoming involved with the seedy criminal underworld as she goes. Sounds like a fun summer read.

Or, you know, you could just buy all 25 books for $6.25 and take care of your entire summer reading with a couple clicks of your mouse.