u/Soapist_Culture

Have I missed something, is this totally legitimate and I'm just barking up the wrong tree?

This morning I noticed that a friend who writes very few but very good reviews, had 211 likes within a very short time. So I checked them out and got chatgpt to analyse them. 62% of the likes are from private profiles, 95% of those profiles have under 10 books, 21.5% had 0 books 0 reviews. Lots of them had similar names Sean, Shawn, Shauna, Sharon, Shane; multiple Sheilas, Shanes, Danis, and similar pairs and the account IDs were very close to each other, like they had been made at the same time.

Additionally there were quite a few profiles set up in 2024 that had come on to GR very infrequently and only to like this person's reviews and sometimes one other person's just once.

This isn't an author and the book was non-fiction so it's not some kind of marketing scheme.

Currently we are in Uzbekistan, hoping to go to Georgia in a couple of days. My partner has Multiple Sclerosis (it is obvious, he limps etc) and has many medications including vitamins, statins, ibuprofen, etc that are just in plastic bags including the syringes of betaseron, no original packaging, no prescriptions, no doctor's notes. The notes for getting into Georgia are that they are very strict on medications and have to have them in original packaging and prescriptions. Does anyone know if we are likely to be stopped and asked for prescriptions etc? Thanks.

Currently we are in Uzbekistan, we were looking to go to Georgia in a couple of days. My partner has Multiple Sclerosis (it is obvious, he limps etc) and has many medications that are just in plastic bags including the syringes of betaseron, no original packaging, no prescriptions, no doctor's notes. I have a statin, a micronised progesterone, vitamins and diazepam. None in original packaging, may have a prescription on my phone. Are we likely to be asked for prescriptions?

My partner, 70, has had MS for decades. He has left-side weakness and footdrop, is on a pescatarian no-saturated fat diet (extremely strict), is on Betasteron, Terafudemide (sorry if I have spelled them wrong) and loads of vitamins. He exercises daily or at least rides his bike to work (he's a professor in Miami), and is generally high energy but needs lots of sleep.

Recently he started to feel fatigued and had a blood test which said he had very low iron, he had an infusion but same result. They said his body wasn't making red blood cells and it wasn't anything to do with nutrition. They said they would investigate when we came back from our trip. We are travelling a lot because we don't know how long his mobility will last.

Right now we are in Delhi after quite a strenuous few weeks in Kathmandu and Bhutan, supposed to be on our way to Uzbekistan, but he is so tired, his lips are blue-ish, he has big grey bags under his eyes and is not exercising, and doing a lot of sleeping. He's eating a lot of food though. His urgency with urination has got worse.

I don't know what to do to help. I am worried this might be some kind of cancer and want to make the best of this trip for him. Does anyone have any advice of how to boost him up for the next four weeks? Or any idea what this might be?

Sorry for this being so long, I wasn't sure what to include and what not to. Thanks.

Some more resources for free books. There are many phone ebook readers, I use T2S which has quite expressive text readers in different voices if you prefer audio to ebooks. I actually prefer ebooks read aloud without the acting type of expression of audio books but if you are a devoted audio fan you mightn't like it but if you can't find the book you want as an audio it might be worth giving it a few days trial on different voices before dismissing it. Anyway, to the list:

• Wattpad - massive collection of contemporary romance, young adult, fantasy romance, and general fiction from independent authors. Ebook only.

• Inkitt - platform for unpublished and emerging authors with a strong focus on romance, fantasy romance, contemporary fiction, and thrillers. Ebook only.

• Galatea - serialized romance and fantasy-romance stories from contemporary authors, with some narrated content available. Audio & ebooks.

• Radish Fiction - serialized romance, contemporary fiction, paranormal romance, and romantic suspense from modern authors. Audio & ebooks.

• Scribble Hub - contemporary web-fiction platform with substantial romance, fantasy romance, and slice-of-life content. Ebook only.

• Tapas Novels - serialized contemporary fiction with strong romance, LGBTQ+, fantasy romance, and young-adult categories. Ebook only.

• Quotev Stories - large collection of user-generated romance and contemporary fiction. Ebook only.

• Romance Audiobooks Podcast - free romance audiobook samples, novellas, and serialized romantic fiction from contemporary authors. Audio only.

• Story Origin Free Books - authors regularly offer free contemporary romance, romantic comedy, fantasy romance, and women’s fiction titles. Ebook only.

• Belletristica - community-driven platform for modern fiction, romance, fantasy, and original stories from independent writers. Ebook only.

• BookFunnel Free Books - directory of free books directly from independent authors, including romance, fantasy, thriller, and contemporary fiction; some audiobook editions are available. Audio & ebooks.

• Internet Archive - Huge collection of public domain and user-uploaded audiobooks, ebooks, music (including very rare old recordings, I found stuff my BiL who has Alzheimers listened to in his youth. We are in the Caribbean on an island which back then had 8K population and I even found calypsos from there), videos and documents
• Project Gutenberg -Thousands of public domain books, many with audio versions
• Librivox - 21K audio books in the public domain, read by amateur readers
• Open Culture - Curated list of free audiobooks and courses
• Loyal Books - Large catalog of public domain audiobooks
• Libby - You need a library card for this but it distinguishes itself by mostly having modern fiction, the others are more classic books.
• Open Library - This is ebooks, not audio and like Libby has modern fiction, but because of legal things, you borrow the book.

• Internet Archive - Huge collection of public domain and user-uploaded audiobooks, ebooks, music (including very rare old recordings, I found stuff my BiL who has Alzheimers listened to in his youth. We are in the Caribbean on an island which back then had 8K population and I even found calypsos from there), videos and documents
• Project Gutenberg -Thousands of public domain books, many with audio versions
• Librivox - 21K audio books in the public domain, read by amateur readers
• Open Culture - Curated list of free audiobooks and courses
• Loyal Books - Large catalog of public domain audiobooks
• Libby - You need a library card for this but it distinguishes itself by mostly having modern fiction, the others are more classic books.
• Open Library - This is ebooks, not audio and like Libby has modern fiction, but because of legal things, you borrow the book.