The solution to all my ebook problems
One of the better things since sliced bread, is Calibre, which I downloaded for free this morning. I wanted to send The Witch's Boy to a reviewer, but he only accepted .epub files, and WB only came in .pdf or .mobi format. Now, thanks to the magic of Calibre, I can just convert my .mobi file into an .epub file and send him that.
One of the reasons why I haven't been on a total ebook spending spree on Amazon was that I have a Cybook Gen ereader, not a Kindle, and Kindle's DRM prevented me reading any of their books on my ereader, even if I had paid good money to buy them.
Kindle for PC is all very well, but I don't want to have to take my PC with me when I'm on holiday, or going to the shops, or waiting for the bus, or any one of those places where I would normally take a book with me. Also, to be frank, I'm just never going to sit down and read a book on the computer. The eyestrain! The piles! The constant feeling that I ought to be doing something useful instead.
Now, with the aid of some Calibre plugins, available here, I can also convert kindle books (legally purchased by me) into books I can actually read on my own personal e-reader. Shocking thought! The appalling consequences for Amazon from this are that I might actually start buying their ebooks now. Well, I would, if only all the ones I wanted were available in my country, but I guess that's a grouch for another day.
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I agree that Calibre is very useful for that. I bought a pdf which wouldn't work on my Sony eReader, due (I think) to encryption. It would work on my computer, but I can't read on my computer, either. So I used Calibre to convert it to epub and now I can read it. Since I paid for it legitimately, I don't see a problem with this. But I strongly suggest making backup copies of your original files, before using Calibre on them. My husband had a bunch of eBooks corrupted by the program, when he tried converting to lrf format -- the fonts were all randomly sized throughout the books.
Jamie wrote: "I agree that Calibre is very useful for that. I bought a pdf which wouldn't work on my Sony eReader, due (I think) to encryption. It would work on my computer, but I can't read on my computer, ei..."Oh, thanks for the tip! I hadn't thought of that, but it's a good idea and I will do it in future.
I agree that I see no problem with me converting a book I have legally bought into a format in which I can actually read it. It's a shame some of the sellers don't seem to agree.
