Children's Ebook Sales Surge in 2014 in Public Libraries and Schools Through OverDrive

January 13, 2015-Cleveland, OH-OverDrive, the leading sales channel for eBooks, audiobooks, and other premium media to libraries and schools, announced today that library spending on children's, juvenile, and young adult eBooks in 2014 grew by 48% over 2013. Helping drive this dramatic growth was OverDrive's 2014 launch of narrated eBooks and highly-illustrated best-selling children's titles using open industry-standard EPUB3 and OverDrive Read.

These popular children's eBook titles are compatible with any device connected to a web browser, including PCs, tablets, and mobile devices.Libraries and schools have purchased tens of thousands of titles that showcase illustrations and two-page "across the spine" display of images with the story faithfully reproducing the print editions. As a result of OverDrive's support for open-standard HTML5 and EPUB3, award-winning and iconic children's authors and brands, including classic titles from Dr. Seuss, are now available as eBooks for lending from thousands of libraries and schools with an OverDrive catalog.Narrated eBooks, with audio synced to text, include titles from actors and authors such as John Lithgow, Randy Travis, and Ray Charles, among others. Several narrated titles incorporate a full soundtrack and sound effects. The top-selling narrated eBook titles to libraries for 2014 from OverDrive were: