Welcome to Buffy’s Corner, where I take a look at what’s coming up this week on the blog! I’m linking up with The Sunday Post over at Kimberly’s blog, The Caffeinated Reviewer:-D
Happy Easter everyone! A couple of things I’ve been thinking about this week:
By now I’m sure you’ve heard that The Book Depository is closing. I’m very sad about this. I use it for blog giveaways, and any time I want a UK edition of a book, that’s my go to site to buy it. In fact, the M.R. Carey book I talked about last week was my most recent Book Depository purchase. I’ve heard there are some good alternates that also have free shipping, let me know if you use any!
So I ran into a technical problem with my Kindle, and I’m wondering if anyone knows the answer to this question. NetGalley recently switched over to the epub format (I believe it was Kindle that made the switch first?), and despite the fact that I have an old Kindle, the epub files I download from NetGalley work. (I don’t really understand why). But sometimes I get files directly from authors or publishers (without going through NetGalley), and in these cases, the epub format doesn’t work when I transfer it to my Kindle. I’m baffled as to why. Any tech savvy readers out there who understand why, I’d love to know. I recently tried to open an epub file from an author and discovered I couldn’t read her book! Also, before you ask, yes I tried to convert epub to mobi and that didn’t work either.
Upcoming reads and reviews:
It’s a rather ambitious week for me. I’m planning to post three reviews, all books I really enjoyed. Death Watch is a high concept thriller that was tons of fun. Untethered Sky is a beautifully written fantasy novella, and Thursday I’m going to be on the blog tour for Descendant Machine, an exciting space opera and the follow-up to Powell’s Stars & Bones. I’ve also started reading This Delicious Death, a YA horror that is also a lot of fun. Not sure what’s up after that, but I’ve got plenty to choose from!
Other posts this week:
Top Ten Tuesday is an animal related theme, so of course I’m going to participate:-) With so many new books and cover reveals announced, I’m finding it hard to choose only three books for Future Fiction. And I’ll probably do a book haul on Saturday.
In case you missed:
My posts from last week:
The Friday Face-Off: Hidden Pictures by Jason Rekulak
The Scourge Between Stars by Ness Brown – Review 3/5 stars
Most Anticipated Books of 2023 – Second Quarter
Lone Women by Victor LaValle – Review 5/5 stars
I am so bummed about Book Depository, if you find a good free shipping alternative let me know! That bird pic is so cool!
Have a great week and happy reading!
Stormi
Stormi recently posted…Week in Review #29 ~ Happy Easter
I will definitely let you know! Have a good week, Stormi:-)
Are you transferring the files directly with USB? I think you need to email them to your kindle email address and let Amazon do the conversion. Although I’m still getting my own converting-to-mobi to work okay.
calypte recently posted…Descendant Machine – Gareth Powell
Thank you! I tried the email trick and it worked:-) I’m glad I asked!
I am sad about The Book Depository too! Something I have done occasionally lately is just get an Amazon UK or Canada account and send gift cards to people who use those. I’m wondering if I can do that for other countries as well! I’ve even signed up for a free month of prime on those at times to send books. I made sure to mark on my blog calendar when to cancel, a week early too, so I won’t get charged, lol. I’ve got This Delicious Death to read. I DNFed the last book by the author, but I’m giving another chance since this one sounds really good. I have actually had the opposite issues with my newer Kindle and Netgalley’s files not always going through even though the epub that publishers and authors send work fine. No idea, it’s a pain! Hope you have a good week!
Lisa Mandina (Lisa Loves Literature) recently posted…Weekly Wrap-Up #114 – April 9th, 2023
That’s a great option! I’m about halfway through This Delicious Death and it’s pretty good:-)
I’m curious about any other options you may have heard of that’s a good sub for Book Depository. I’ve been trying to find some.
I’ll be researching it for sure:-)
I wish I could help with your Kindle problem. My Kindle’s are pretty old but I’ve not run into the specific problem you’re seeing (I don’t think I’ve ever gotten ebooks either directly from authors or via NetGalley). And I was thinking about The Book Depository when I heard Amazon was shuttering them. They started independent before Amazon bought them. Perhaps with them closing there’s now an opportunity for someone else to take over that portion of the market. Here’s hoping that happens and whoever does doesn’t just get swallowed by a larger fish.
I’ve very curious for this week’s reviews. Death Watch, I still love that title. And I love the covers for both Untethered Sky and Descendant Machine.
Always love seeing red-winged blackbirds in flight! 🙂
I’ve heard there are other online booksellers that ship internationally for free, I just can’t remember who at the moment, but I will research it:-)
I’ll also be looking for a Book Depository replacement. I see someone mentioned it above. Are you using USB or emailing it to your kindle address. I email it and have had no problems. My Kindle is pretty old. I almost never use it and mostly read on my phone these days. It’s small but the operating system is faster.
Thanks Anne, I didn’t know you could email the file, so I tried it and it worked!!
I’m also really surprised and sad about Book Depository — although before reading the news about their closure, I hadn’t realized that they were owned by Amazon. What a bummer. I liked being able to get paperbacks of books only available in hardcover in the US, and the free shipping was a great incentive to use them. 🙁
I didn’t know they were owned by Amazon either. Not sure why they would do that!
First Amazon “changes” the way indie authors can get their .mobi files to readers (the “Send to Kindle” app), and now Book Depository is no more. Amazon is making it too obvious they’re trying to become the next “Super Conglomerate.” That being said, I need to check the status of my order on Amazon.
It makes you wonder what’s next, right? :-/
Happy Easter! I’m bummed about Book Depository. I’ve used it a few times and it’s been a great resource for getting stuff I couldn’t otherwise get. Between that and ComiXology getting all nerfed it’s gonna be harder for me to get some of the European graphic novels.
I have to go read your review of Scourge…
Greg recently posted…Song of the Week #154
Yes… glad you’ve got your glitch sorted out with Amazon and the new epub version. I’m more than a bit concerned that converting my Word documents into an epub document to be published as an ebook might need an alternative option to the one I’ve been using. A lot of self publishing writers are having to get hold of different software for the formatting… Oh well – I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it! The pic of the red-winged blackbird is gorgeous:)). Here’s hoping you have a great reading week, Tammy.
I have a Kindle Fire and have noticed no difference in downloads so that shows you how much I pay attention. I will say that I had to read Burn the Negative on the Netgalley app on my phone because I couldn’t get it any other way and almost went blind. I am also sure that it contributed to some of my frustration with the book overall.
Beautiful bird photo! Unfortuantely I don’t know the answer to your Kindle question. I know around when Kindle made the switch I could still download the old file format, but sometimes it would take a couple days to show up on my Kindle. I think that was last September or something? I don’t know. Older Kindles are finicky…I gave up on mine last year and ordered myself a new one because my old one was so slow.
I was so sad about Book Depository too! And maybe you need to approve the author’s document to download it?
I was really bummed to hear about Book Depository. That was my go to place for UK covers too.
I’m also really bummed about Book Depository closing. I’ve used Blackwell’s before and had good experiences with them as well (same UK options and free international shipping still as far as I know, similar delivery times), so I’d recommend them as an alternative to check out. I’m not sure what the issue with your Kindle is, that sounds odd! I have a Kindle Paperwhite from 2012 (it’s suuuper slow, lol, but it works) and it has successfully been able to transfer epubs from authors that I’ve received. Do you transfer them to your Kindle via email? That’s quite a puzzle, and sounds very frustrating.
Jordan @ Forever Lost in Literature recently posted…Review: The Bone Shard War (The Drowning Empire #3) by Andrea Stewart