I was shocked to just discover The Oops Factor book on Fallen Gate. It occurs to me that many people may not be aware of Book Quests. Book quests allow you to squeeze extra XP out of a zone you'll be playing in anyway, while getting to learn a big chunk of interesting lore about Norrath (my absolute favorite is The Oops Factor), and you get a book at the end you can place in your home. Go visit your home city's mage guild, and seek out the Sage. You can purchase a bunch of book quest starters (use the Book Quests timeline to figure out which ones you want to pick up). Exploration Books: If you are going to be adventuring in Qeynos, Freeport, Antonica, and/or the Commonlands, get "The History of X" books. These require you to read them to start the quest (you must not be in a dialog with the Sage). There are three quests in each one (levels 10, 20, and 30). You'll be directed to visit certain locations, get the ding, then you read the book again to continue the story. Cataloging Creatures Books: If you're playing in the outlying zones adjacent to Qeynos (The Peat Bog, Oakmyst Forest, Forest Ruins, the Caves) or those adjacent to Freeport (Sunken City, The Graveyard, The Ruins, The Sprawl); or adventuring under the cities in their sewers/catacombs; or playing in any of the Shattered Lands overland zones (Antonica, Commonlands, Nek, Thundering Steppes, etc.), then the cataloging book quests are great. You have to get within 15m of a given target creature, then use the Catalogue Creature ability. No killing required! In the overland zones, you can purchase these books from gratified merchants (if you see a distressed merchant, kill everything around them, then they become gratified). Kill Quest Books: These books require you to kill 3-10 creatures for each step of the quest. Some of these books contain three series of quests, others just a single story. You kill however many critters a step requires, then read the next page of the story (generally there are 10 pages). These are creatures you will be needing for other quests as well, and many times the same kills will update multiple books.
Book quests are a great way to guide exploration in a given area, earn extra experience on top of the grind, and actually learn something about the game world at the same time. These book quests often contain significant chunks of the original game lore.
I do want to say that, though I died a lot, my Qeynosian Fallen Gate gnome has managed to do "The History of X" books that require locations in Freeport. With some experimentation and careful timing, it is possible to get to every one of the dings... although a guard may slaughter you right after the update
The dropped book quests from the individual dungeons are a lot of fun too. The books that drop in The Obelisk of Lost Souls will detail the histories of each of the different void races.
