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Book reviews: PDF vs. physical book
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Sometimes I do get a book in pdf format if that's all the author has but that would probably mean I really want to read the book. I have turned down reading and reviewing books because I dislike reading the pdf format.
Of course who doesn't love the actual paperback copy of a book. But because of shipping and the costs I don't seem to find a lot of authors offering that. Goodreads is full of people from different countries so I suspect shipping costs could be high. Being from Canada I don't get many offers for an actual copy of their book. Plus then you have to add the cost of the actual book, there are probably many reason physical copies are not always offered.
I own an ipad and kindle so I can read just about anything.
It's not just shipping to countries other than the author's, it's the customs forms that have to be filled out for packages.I NEVER ship anything to my family in Mexico; we learned a long time ago that a package may never get to its intended destination, or may be damaged, or, worse still, require a customs payment larger than the value of the contents.
People from the States didn't get this, and they would send us packages. After a couple at extortionate prices, my mother would just refuse the packages. I don't know if they were sent back, confiscated, or destroyed. I do know that a couple of times she paid for them, the contents weren't worth it.
I have electronic versions - most people have some way of reading them, phone or tablet or desktop.
I prefer ePub for iBooks. I have Calibre, the free ebook converter so other formats aren't a problem if they are't DRMed. Calibre does PDFs too, which is good because PDFs are large files, being a collection of images in one file. I have kindle for iOS (iPad/iPhone) and Mac. iBooks and Kindle both have bookmark features, though generally if you close and reopen the program it'll remember where you left off. Bookmarking really is to let you sync your place in a book over several devices. I like it because I can stop at a certain place on my iPad and pick it up on my phone at the same spot and vice versa.
Both kindle and iBooks will let you adjust the text size on most books and you can adjust the way the program "turns a page" so it acts like turning the page on a hard copy book.
I'm a heavy reader so I like ebooks because I can carry a lot (and I mean A LOT) of books with me on both devices and through Dropbox so I'm never without something to read.
PDFs are the most clunky form of reading there is, for me. If an author can send me a Kindle version of his/her book, I can load it on my Kindle and that thing goes everywhere with me. It's much lighter than most books, and I can adjust the size of the font to my eyes. I used to think I would always prefer a real, dead-tree book, but I have changed. By the way, Megan: you can also sign up for daily emails from BookBub, FreeBooksy, BargainBooksy, and Fussy Librarian. These are all free for you, and send you emails adjusted to your own tastes. They are all designed to let you know about free books every day.
Most of what I get from Bookbub are discounted books, not free (except for the ripped shirt romances, I signed up for Historical Romance and get the explicit Harlequins).
Perhaps it's a generational thing or habit with me, but I read only traditional print books. Most of the books I read are borrowed from the local library. I only purchase a book if I feel that I will want to read it more than once or if it is part of a trilogy or series. All of the 110 books on the shelves in my den are either hard cover or paperback. I also like to listen to an audio book while on a long road trip.Two of my adult children prefer e-books and two prefer traditional print books, but occasionally read e-books for the sake of convenience.
I only do real or PDF (my computer), Word can be a pain in the A to read, & split screen (2 pages on 1) PDF yuk, those stupid reading machines like cell phones 2 weeks & there will be a newer version
real books over time can be very toxic 2 humans, especially where they are stored/kept
The most effective marketing strategy for almost any product is to provide a variety of styles, models or formats in order to satisfy the varied tastes of the consumers of that specific product. Therefore, the majority of the time, a publisher will produce a book in all four formats: traditional print, electronic, audio on compact disc and audio download.
True about the multilevel formats, but like I said, there is Calibre for Mac and PC. It converts PDFs, mobi, azw, ePub, and a bunch of others. Word files have to be converted to html before Calibre will read them, but that's not hard to do. Amazon will not release their books in ePub format because they want to compete with the iBooks store and Nook readers. I buy a lot of books on Amazon, simply because I like the ability to store books on my own media and not just on a cloud, which is what iBooks insists on doing. I also like that it's easier to lend books on Kindle, iBooks insists that a user lends someone their Apple ID and password, which I'm not going to do, even with my parents, in order to lend a book. But I like iBooks for reading better.
So the theme of my life is CALIBRE, CALIBRE, CALIBRE.
Hi Carrie,You said files can be converted to PDF using Calibre. I have Calibre and have converted a file to mobi using it. It's been awhile since I used the Calibre program. Can I use an ePub file and convert it to PDF using Calibre?
Yes, but why would you? A PDF is much larger than a ePub. While a PDF is a collection of images in one file, an ePub is a collection of html pages, each time you see a chapter break you have a new html file. So what you're doing in converting an epub to a PDF is converting a collection of text files (ePub) to a collection of image files (PDF).
It's easier to extract the html files to text or into separate html files with Calibre then combine and save them as a PDF via Word (the one Microsoft product I do use without protest).
I know all of this because when I switched over to ebooks, I scanned (yes it was a LOT of work) a lot of my hard copy books and made gem into ebooks. I had to do a lot of correction of the OCR from the PDF because I didn't have Calibre at the time and changing images to text is always chancy. If I feel the need to edit the books I made, I use a Mac program called Sigil, which is how I learned what an ePub really is.
Hi Carrie,Thank you for this valuable information. Upon your suggestion I downloaded Calibre yesterday. I converted my Word file to a .mobi file. It was real cool seeing my book on my ereader. The only problem I had was a blank page appeared between each chapter. I use page breaks after the last character (usually a period) of each chapter and I do not press return. Are the Calibre updates automatic?
Thank you, Sue
Yeah, I don't know how to fix Mobis, sorry. ePub is my media, as I've said. You might try googling to see if there's a mobi editor out. The Calibre updates are unfortunately not automatic, you'll get a notice in the program that an update is out and click the yes update will take you to the webpage to install. Even though the updates are free, I have to say they're annoyingly frequent. I ran out of patience a few updates ago and it seems I never have the time to update when I want to convert some books.
Carrie, I will follow your advice. Thank you again.
Carrie,The reason I wanted to convert from an ePub is that I have no cover attached to a Word file. Is it possible to do it this way?
You don't need to convert it to change the cover, you can do it from inside Calibre. I can't look at the program right now, but I change and add cover images to epubs in Calibre all the time.
I prefer reading physical and PDF. If I'm reading a ebook I prefer it's PDF because that's the format I send my books out in so its just sort of preference over what I myself use.
Lenita, to the right of the add books drop down there is one labeled edit metadata. Select the book you want to edit the cover, then go to edit metadata individually and go from there.
I always prefer reading in DOC format because I can't help but see errors and typos when I read. That way I can mark it up as I go and send the notes back to the author.
I'm curious to see what formats of books people prefer: PDF or an actual hard copy of the book? I'm curious because I'm looking for books to read in exchange for a review. It seems like most of them are PDF versions.
I usually prefer an actual book. I enjoy turning the pages and keeping my place with a bookmark. (I know, I know. It seems so nerdy).
Does anyone prefer to print out PDF's and create a book with it? I was thinking about it, but that would be a lot of paper and ink. I need to get used to reading it on a screen. Also, how do you keep your place in the book if it's a PDF?
Let me know what everyone prefers!