Many thanks to all the suggestions and advice that was given. It was all very helpful and much appreciated! As you can see I found an MP3 player! If you live in the Midwest you might be familiar with Nebraska Furniture Mart. They carry furniture and household appliances but also electronics. Usually they have a good selection and competitive prices, so that was my first stop in my search. Unfortunately they didn't have as good a selection as I had hoped. The first salesman who helped me was a college student who looked a little bewildered when I said I need a player for music but also books and I wanted one with a bookmarking feature. Swish--over the head (books?). When I said I guess people use these more for listening to music, he replied more confidently that yes they did. Okay, I'll just keep browsing. A few minutes later a saleslady came by (also a college student) who had at least caught on to the possibility of using these for audio books. I had written down a list of players I wanted to look at, and then left the list at home. She at least offered to look up the players that used bookmarks.
List in hand I went to Best Buy next. I wanted to find a Creative Zen player, but they don't carry them, but the salesman (another college student) was very helpful. When I told him no one seemed to know anything about using these for audio books he rolled his eyes, as he does use them for listening to books as well as music. He suggested buying an Insignia MP3 player. Actually I think this is the Best Buy brand, and while there are things about it that sort of annoy me, I think in the end it should fit my needs just fine. It took some fumbling, but I managed to load the software, power up the machine and finally load several albums and a book onto the player. It's just a matter of remembering where everything is on it. It is a 4GB machine and can hold up to 1,000 songs, 4,000 photos (I doubt I'll use this feature), 50 audio books, and 14 movies. What I don't like about the player is the software, which hooks up to the Best Buy store and something called Rhapsody. I think I'd rather not have the ease of being hooked up to a store where I can spend lots of money on music, so I have been using Windows Media Player instead and it works just fine. They have also partnered with Audible Books, which I might try at some time.
For the time being, however, I went to my public library's website and loaded a free book on to my player. It wasn't my first choice (there were lines for the books I'm interested in), but for the sake of expediency I loaded the OverDrive software and then Elizabeth Berg's Dream When You're Feeling Blue to get a feel for how the process is done. I've decided that in terms of books I want to mainly listen to nonfiction (maybe history or science titles), but also I want to listen to classics that I've already read. It probably sounds strange, but I'm really particular in terms of what I want to listen to. I think I'd rather not listen to novels that I haven't yet read. I would like to listen to certain books, however (like The Iliad and Odyssey) along with reading them. Can you tell I've thought about this a little? I'm planning on using the machine primarily when I am walking outside and in the gym. And yes, this has a bookmarking feature. You can also keep your audio books in a special file and if you are listening to your book, when you turn off the machine it simply stops the book there until you turn the machine back on again and it continues where you left off. Now I'll have to figure out how to load podcasts! Any suggestions for interesting or literary podcasts?
Oh yeah, you might have noticed that stack of books? Sorry, I have gone on a bit about my new player. In the last few days I've received a few books in the mail. A couple are ARCs, one was a gift and the other two are books I ordered. From top to bottom: Jo Nesbo's The Devil's Star--this is not next in the Harry Hole series, so I'll hold off starting it, (but Nemesis is and it will be out in just a couple of weeks!), Knut Hamsun's Victoria (a little Norwegian author binge here!), Amanda Eyre Ward's Forgive Me is an ARC, Mary Doria Russell's Dreamers of the Day is another ARC, but another reader sent this to me after she read it, and finally author Michelle Moran sent me a copy of her book, Nefertiti to review. I'm looking forward to starting some of these books very soon.