Earlier this month Google released a significant update to Google Play Books that greatly improved the comic book reading experience within the eBook reading app. Basically that update brought a much improved reading of comics that allows you in landscape mode to quickly and easily move between panels and follow the story line. Today another update has come out for the app that further improves the user experience when reading comics, especially when you are moving between books in a series.
The update to Google Play Books is build 3.7.23 for those keeping score at home and is now in the Google Play Store. If you have the app already installed on your device, you should see the OTA update in the next day or so. If you are a reader of comics then you should certainly get this update installed quickly.
Google Play Books – Free (In-App Purchases) – Download Now
Google Play Books Has Improved Navigation Between Issues
There are two major changes to this update of Google Play Books. First, you can now see all of the volumes or issues of your favorite comics series on the series page in Read Now or in your
Comics in Google Play Books
library. Not sure if you have all the issues in The Walking Dead (my current comic of choice)? Now you can see all of the ones in the series and make sure you indeed have all of them purchased for reading.
The app also has improved navigation when moving from one issue to the next. Before, if I wanted to move from Issue #1 to Issue #2, I had to drop out of reading mode, go to my library, tap on Issue #2 and then start reading it. Not a real big pain but just more taps than I would prefer. Apparently Google agrees. Now when you reach the last page of the book you are reading you have the option to Jump to the next book in the series without having to drop out of reading mode.
If you have purchased a compiled series of books from the Google Play Store (for example, The Game of Thrones 5-Book Box Set) then you will be familiar with this feature. When you reach the end of a book in a compiled series, you can just start reading the next one straight away. Google has brought this same feature to comic books.
Finally, Google continues to have many comic and comic series on sale in the Store with a fairly good selection for free. If you are wanting to get started in a particular series, now is not a bad time to do it.
