Now you can “Look Inside” Kindle books!

Amazon has implemented its Look Inside functionality for Kindle books. That means when you look at the product page for, say, The Sixth Discipline, you can read the beginning of the book without needing to download the sample. The same is true for No Safe Haven, of course.

I'm sure it's no accident that this feature was added just as Amazon launched its Cloud Reader function. It helps considerably in overcoming the lack of a buy button in the Kindle for iPad app. If you're using an iPad, you can get to Amazon with a browser, use Look Inside to see if you want the book, buy it, and then start reading it.  In fact, since the Look Inside chunk appears to match the free sample chunk exactly (except that it has no cover), you could say Look Inside for Kindle books is really just Cloud Reader for the Free Sample.

Blog update

In case you hadn't noticed, I added a tab for eBooks & eReaders. There is some very basic info there, aimed mostly at folks who aren't familiar with ebooks at all. Of course, from time to time, I will also post about developments in digital publishing and digital reading (especially when one of my ebooks comes out).

But check out the ebooks tab if you want some links to other good sources on the web.

I'm now on Shelfari!

One of the social networking sites dedicated to readers and book-lovers is called Shelfari. I recently joined it, and added myself as a Shelfari author.  You can see my profile here.

I am already on Goodreads and LibraryThing, but one reason I bothered to join Shelfari is that it is owned by Amazon; when authors add info to their books (i.e., books they wrote)— like characters' names, story setting, and such— on Shelfari, Amazon creates a link to the Shelfari info on the book description page on Amazon.  This gives authors a chance to get more info about their books to potential readers. Plus, Shelfari is one more group of people who love to read, and I am all about readers.

Check out the Book Extras section on the Amazon page for The Sixth Discipline and you'll see the link to Shelfari.

eReader Panel at the Baltimore Book Festival

If you are in the Baltimore area, and you have any interest in ereaders, I will be at the Baltimore Book Festival on Friday, September 23, participating in a panel, sponsored by the Maryland Romance Writers, on "Which E-Reader is Right For You?"  The panel starts at 1:00. Details are here.

I'll post a reminder when it's closer to that date.

Tribes is on its way!

The edited manuscript for Tribes is at the conversion house and should be back the last week in August.  Depending on how long the final proof takes, it should be on all ebook platforms by the first week in September.

See the top right corner of this page for the cover of Tribes.

The Sixth Discipline got its first review on Smashwords!

A Smashwords customer gave The Sixth Discipline four stars and said some nice things about it in this brief but still quite nice review!

A nice review for No Safe Haven

So far all my reviews have been for The Sixth Discipline, but since the Books and Things reviewer showed an interest  I sent him the sequel, and he has posted this lovely review of No Safe Haven.

Here's a quote I copied to the Amazon page for the book:

“The suspense, political intrigue and excitement around this plotline had me unable to put the book down for very long. The other plotlines were enjoyable as well and I was specifically happy to see that the major open plotline from the first book was closed down to a rather satisfactory ending.”

I'm so happy he liked it!

A reminder about the Hugos

Attention! The deadline for voting in the Hugos using the online ballot is July 31. If you are either an attending or a supporting a member of Renovation, you get a vote to say which short story, novelette, novella, novel, editor, movie, etc. should win a Hugo. In fact, you get a Voter Reading Packet that lets you read virtually all the nominated prose for free (well, free in the sense that it doesn't cost extra; you do have to buy a membership/.

I downloaded my packet a while ago and I'm frantically trying to finish reading everything. Well, not really every novel. If I didn't like it, I just stopped reading. Otherwise I wouldn't have time for the shorter works.  But I plan to have at least assessed everything before I cast my ballot.

Kindle tips: putting non-Amazon ebooks on your Kindle

I was showing a friend how to put non-Amazon books on her Kindle, and she said to me, “You should teach a class!” Well, I don't think I need to do that; but just in case other folks out there don't know about it, I wanted to pass on this tip. Some people think if you buy a Kindle, you can only buy books from Amazon. That's not actually true, or perhaps I should say, it's only partly true.

Books from iBooks, Sony, or Nook ebookstores generally have proprietary DRM (digital rights management software) that allows the book to be read only on a specific device or app that is linked to that bookstore. Books from those vendors are also in ePub format (a standard format, but not supported by Kindles), as are many of the free books on the web. A great source for free, non-DRM, out-of-copyright books is Project Gutenburg, which offers ebooks in different formats. If an epub book doesn't have DRM, you can easily convert it to the Kindle format using Calibre, free ebook conversion and management software (they do rely on donations, so consider making one if you use it and like it). Calibre can convert ebooks to and from Mobi (Kindle), epub, RTF, PDF and other formats.

There are a few ebookstores that sell ebooks in Kindle format but without DRM, and these books are perfectly compatible with any Kindle. Two excellent examples are Smashwords and O'Reilly. Smashwords is an enormous ebookstore that sells nonfiction and fiction ebooks in pretty much every format, even PDF and plain text. O'Reilly sells technical books, and they also offer multiple formats, and a daily ebook deal. These vendors generally offer books in Kindle format, so you don't have to convert them. With Smashwords, you will need to download the file to your computer and then move it to your Kindle. O'Reilly offers an email option for Method 2, described below.

Moving files to a Kindle: Method 1
One way to do this it to download the book, and then connect the Kindle to the PC/Mac with the USB cable, and then drag the file into the Documents folder on the Kindle. The file extension should be either azw, mobi., or prc for the file to appear as a Kindle book when you open it on the Kindle. This method does not require wireless access and doesn't incur any charge from Amazon.

Moving files to a Kindle: Method 2

The second method is simpler but does require a one-time set-up step; you can email documents to your Kindle. The first thing to do is to go to the Manage My Kindle page, accessible from your Amazon My Account page, and whitelist your email address, and any other email address that you want to be ale to send books to your Kindle.  Every Kindle has its own email address, and to prevent it from getting spam, only email from addresses you have authorized will be accepted by your Kindle. So, first find your Kindle address by clicking Manage Your Devices on your Kindle page, left column, and make a note of it.

Next, whitelist the email address(es) you will use to send documents to your Kindle by clicking  Personal Document Settings and using the link for add a new approved email address.  If you buy books from O'Reilly or  any other vendor that offers non-DRMed Kindle format ebooks and email delivery, you can add their email addresses and send books you buy from those vendors directly from their website without downloading first.

Once you have done that set-up step, you can send any file with a mobi or prc extension to your Kindle by creating an email, addressing it to your Kindle, and then attaching the file. You can also send personal documents (plain text or MS Word files) and PDFs using the same email method. If you have a PDF you want Amazon to convert to a Kindle book (don't expect it to be perfect), you must put the word ‘convert’ (and only that word) in the subject line of the message; if you don't, Amazon will load the book to your Kindle as a PDF and you won't be able to change the font size.

Once caveat to the email delivery is that if you use a 3G connection to deliver the book, Amazon will charge you 15¢ per MB for each file. There is no charge if you use wifi to send the books or other documents, regardless of file size.

Free Books!
One reason I want to be sure Kindle owners know about this feature is that it is much easier to make a book free in Smashwords than on Kindle. Even when Amazon price-matches (which they usually do only if they notice the book is free on Barnes & Noble), they only make the book free in the US Kindle store (as they did with The Sixth Discipline). Folks who are not in the US who want to take advantage of a book promotion can get it in Kindle format from Smashwords and send it to their Kindles. Just be aware that Amazon's tools, like the home screen display and the Manage Your Kindle settings, will treat any book you didn't buy from Amazon as a ‘personal document’ rather than as a book. If you filter your home page to show "Books only," ebooks you got from non-Amazon sources will not show up.

Note: Here's a more recent post on the same topic. And the most recent post on emailing to your Kindle! (Amazon changed some screens)

SF Books reviews The Sixth Discipline

The SFBook Reviews blog has posted a review of The Sixth Discipline.  Reviewer Anthony's post reveals the story and characterization didn't resonate that much with him, but it's not a cruel or dismissive review. Even if the book didn't work that well for him overall, he did like the mix of fantasy and technology, and he thought the ending was satisfying.

This is a very well organized review blog, by the way. The books are indexed by author, title, and genre, which is a very nice feature if you like to browse older reviews. There's also a link for free ebooks.  Always a good thing!