E-Book Pricing Alerts

Discussion in 'Trek Literature' started by JD, Apr 4, 2017.

  1. JWolf

    JWolf Commodore Commodore

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  2. Koric

    Koric Commander Red Shirt

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    Hey all,

    A BIG MISTAKE: Star Trek Vulcan’s Forge is NOT available on Amazon in Kindle. There is the AUDIOBOOK but not the EBOOK.

    Some Wild E. Coyote GENIUS made a mix up on that one. I don’t mean to be disparaging, but It is available on all the other retail sites EXCEPT Amazon. Could I get it somewhere else? Sure. But I like having my ebooks on Amazon’s cloud to download on my kindle fire or to read on my ipad and back and forth.

    Just a heads up. Hopefully someone at S&S will notice and fix the oversight. After all, it’s part of a series. Sorry EVERYONE I’m a completist.

    It’s too bad Children of Kings and Cast no Shadow were not in this month’s sales too.
    This month’s SPOCK’s sales are a promotion for the new December 13th Trek book Harm’s Way by @David Mack

    @youngtrek Thanks :) But also that is why our Trek Ebook Sales thread is so important. It’s the only record for accurate accounting of the past sales as a resource. It used to be you could just enter the month and year and pull up the past sales page from 2016-2021 which I thought was great.

    -Koric
     
    Last edited: Oct 11, 2022
  3. Smiley

    Smiley Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    That’s recent with regards to Vulcan’s Forge. I bought it a couple months ago when it was not on sale, and I could download it tonight on the Kindle app.
     
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  4. Koric

    Koric Commander Red Shirt

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  5. Paul K

    Paul K Ensign Red Shirt

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    That's really weird. I just bought Vulcan's Forge, like a week ago, right after this sale started. So I know it was offered as part of this sale on Amazon at the beginning. But I can't find it anywhere on Amazon now. I still have it on my Kindle though. So I guess I got lucky...
     
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  6. DrBeverly

    DrBeverly Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    I suspect it often depends on if the listing on Amazon is 100% correct in terms of its titling being exactly the same as the S&S listing. Makes me think it's perhaps just automatic, so if it's listed slightly differently, it doesn't get its switch automatically flicked to make it 99p.
     
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  7. Koric

    Koric Commander Red Shirt

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    Hey all...

    Thanks @Smiley @Paul K
    So I think I know what happened with Vulcan’s Forge. The ebook listing says under publisher S & S UK vs Pocket books listed for the publisher.

    Take a look:

    https://www.amazon.com/St-Vulcans-Forge-Star-Original-ebook/dp/B008O5ED74

    So hopefully the ebook will be released for sale again on Amazon. I would like to believe the listing was entered in error. But, damn it I shouldn’t have waited. If you got the ebook, you are lucky.
    @Allyn Gibson any chance the ebook snafu might be fixed so I can get the ebook? I know you have worked with publishers. Or is this a missed opportunity.

    @DrBeverly UK deals and US deals have always been different. Every since the sales started. Also, the UK is missing certain ebooks that the US has, which is bizarre to me. I figured the availability and the sale of the ebooks should be equal, if all things considered are equal?

    ALSO LASTY TO ALL...JUST FYI...AMAZON HAS DROPPED THE ABILITY TO REQUEST BOOKS TO BE AVAILABLE AS AN EBOOK FOR THE PUBLISHERS ON ALL OF THE WEBPAGES. SADLY IT SEEMS IT’S THE OF AN ERA. I used this feature often. LOL. I never knew if I was lucky and if it worked, but I always used it.

    Thanks all. All the best.
    -Koric
     
  8. Kinggodzillak

    Kinggodzillak Captain Captain

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    The UK used to have a lot of the now-missing titles; when I first got my Kindle I drew up a list of what was available to keep an eye on prices and that huge chunk of early TOS & TNG numbered novels that are now missing were pretty much all there. I even still have access to the files of the handful I bought during that time. All rather odd and frustrating.
     
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  9. JWolf

    JWolf Commodore Commodore

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    Given that Star Trek eBooks are without DRM, I suggest buying Vulcan's Forge from either eBooks.com or Kobo.com and you can use either Calibre or Kindlegen to convert to KF8 (AZW3) to read on your Kindle.
     
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  10. Smiley

    Smiley Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Do either of those programs you mentioned have easy-to-follow guides to accomplish that? The most complicated thing I have done with regards to a Kindle is email myself a book file from one of the Tor free downloads.
     
  11. Allyn Gibson

    Allyn Gibson Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Long-time Calibre user.

    Assuming you're working with a DRM-free ebook, it's not difficult.

    Put the file on your desktop.
    In Calibre, click the Add button on the top ribbon, navigate to the file, and add it to your library.
    Once its whirls and wheezes, the ebook will be added to your library. You can right-click on the ebook, and there will be an option to Convert. That will open up a window. On the right-hand top corner, there's a dropdown with a list of ebook formats Calibre can convert to. Pick whatever you need.
    Hit Okay.
    Calibre will take you back to your library while it works. At the right you'll see your book cover, and below it is a list of the formats the book is available in. There's also going to be a spinning job wheel at the bottom right corner. When it's done, the wheel will stop and you'll see a new format available for your book.
    Below the list of formats, there's a link to the folder on your hard drive that contains the book. Open that, and you'll see all of your book's files in its different formats.
    You can then sideload the file format you need to your device from that folder. Just hook up the USB cables, mount the device and file system, and copy away to your heart's content.

    I have absolutely no involvement or power here. I wouldn't know who to talk to, nor why they would want to talk to me if I did. Sorry!
     
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  12. DrBeverly

    DrBeverly Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    You actually don't need to do any of the Calibre conversion anymore. Amazon have flipped a switch that means epubs can now be read on Kindle*, assuming they're DRM-free (which the majority of Trek books are).

    So all you need to do is download the epub from ebooks.com once you've bought it, then email it to your Kindle using your Kindle email address.

    Note that you nearly always lose the cover of the book when you do it this way, or via Calibre, but it's a small price to pay to be able to read them!

    (*just because I know someone will be picky about this, Kindle still doesn't actually support epub, but when you email it to your Kindle using the email address, my understanding is that it actually does the conversion for you. But for all intents and purposes, it works as if Kindle supports epub.)
     
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  13. JWolf

    JWolf Commodore Commodore

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    Sorry, but this is not so. Amazon does not support ePub. You do have to convert the ePub to KF8. I don't know where you got that information, but it's just plain wrong.

    What Amazon is doing is accepting DRM-free ePub for conversion to KF8. So you can email ePub to Amazon or use send-to-Kindle to send ePub. Amazon does not accept ePub directly on a Kindle.
     
  14. Brendan Moody

    Brendan Moody Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I’m guessing you were in such a rush to demonstrate your superior knowledge that you missed the entire last paragraph of the post you quoted, where DrBeverly says exactly what you say in your own post.
     
  15. JWolf

    JWolf Commodore Commodore

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    It's still incorrect to say that Amazon now supports ePub. It's an ePub conversion that's the way it's always been. You've always been able to use Calibre, Kindlegen, or email. With email, you just had to change the file extension to something like .txt.

    But with the "switch" that Amazon flipped, it's a bit broken. No proper metadata is the title is gotten from the filename and no cover. So it's still best to convert using Calibre or KindleGen and then side load via USB. And if there is something the online converter feels is off, it won't convert and if the ePub does not specify that it's UTF-8 then things like quote can come out with the wrong character.
     
  16. ATimson

    ATimson Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    ePub support from emails was working for weeks, if not months, before the title/author issue was introduced. And the metadata issue also impacts pre-converted files. It's not related to adding ePub support at all.
     
  17. JWolf

    JWolf Commodore Commodore

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    But that was with a workaround and not official support. I cannot speak on metadata issues prior to the official ePub email conversion support.

    Thing is, ePub support is now (IMHO) a really big mess and it's best to use Calibre to convert ePub to KF8 and side load via USB.
     
  18. Smiley

    Smiley Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    The Final Reflection by John Ford is $0.99. Other sales may be active, but that was the only one from my wishlist.
     
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  19. Brendan Moody

    Brendan Moody Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Also on sale for $0.99, presumably as an early posting of some of the November deals for the US:

    How Much for Just the Planet?
    The Eugenics Wars 1+2
    Acts of Contrition
    A Pocket Full of Lies
    The Captain’s Oath
    The Lost Years
     
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  20. AygoSquirrel

    AygoSquirrel Ensign Red Shirt

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    Also on sale for 0.99 is Rules of Accusation
     
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