In reply to eBook Font Suggestions Sought:
Condolences on the loss of your nephew.
The latest formats for Kindle (Kindle Format 8, or azw3) and EPUB allow publishers to embed fonts in their ebooks. But I'd second the comment from ldavidson that embedded fonts don't always look good, especially when using e-ink readers. For example, Random House embedded Georgia in the Kindle version of John Grisham's latest book, The Racketeer. You'd think this font would look good on an e-reader, especially the Kindle Paperwhite, which has higher pixel density than most other e-ink readers. But it looks a bit off -- the thin parts of the glyphs seem too thin, at least to my eyes. Meanwhile, the built-in fonts, Palatino and Baskerville, for example, look much better, because these particular versions have been optimized for the device. (The Racketeer looks fine with Georgia on an iPad 3, however, because of the higher pixel density, I suppose.)
Some publishers are having trouble formatting their ebooks in KF8, particularly when migrating the file from a word processor like MSFT Word through the KindleGen software. Apparently Word leaves specific font size and typeface encoding in the file that can make it impossible for the user to select one of the built-in fonts. These problems can also mess up the font sizes. So if you're considering formatting your ebook in KF8, here's a link to a forum thread with an explanation of how to avoid these problems (see the post from mrlasers on Nov 7).
BTW, I was recently reading Matthew Butterick's description of his Equity typeface, and it occurred to me that it might work well on an e-ink reader. I licensed Equity and used Calibre to embed it in a KF8 sample. I think it works well, and I prefer it to the built-in Baskerville and Palatino fonts. I realize Matthew wasn't thinking about e-ink readers when he designed Equity, and some typographers might advise against using a condensed face for long-form reading, but I think it's cool that it works so well, at least to my eyes.
