Torchwood E-Books from PDFs

[tonjavmoore]

As some of you know, I'v been importing PDFs of my favorite fanfics to my Kindle. This allows me to read them where and when I want (like in between sessions at a Dr. Who convention) without being tethered to my computer. I have now found this nice little program called Calibre that is letting me translate the PDFs to ebooks (MOBI format) with metadata and covers and all. I'm redoing my PDFs as ebooks, so that I can take full advantage of the Kindle features. I'm using Live Journal or Dreamwidth names to preserve the integrity of the authors.

(You can convert PDF fics to Amazon Kindle specific files by emailing them to your @free.kindle address, but frankly, the metadata that they generate sucks for air.)

Now to my question. Is there enough interest in this to make my ebooks available to Torchwood fans in a repository? Would the authors approve of it? I personally hate "reinventing the wheel" (translation: I'm lazy), so I would not like to redo the work someone else has already done, and I figure there are others like me out there. I have a website that isn't doing much of anything that I could put them on. It used to be my silly personal site, but I've let it lapse into disuse so it's dusty.

I have to do this in spurts, so it may take awhile for all of them I have now to be converted. Also, I only have Jack/Ianto fics on it (ie. if that pairing isn't in there, I don't bother with it), since that is my main interest. If enough people were interested in having other couple-centric pieces, I'd be more than happy to put them up as well. They just wouldn't necessarily go on my own Kindle.

Thoughts? Discussions? Anything?

Comments

[bethmccombs]

I believe you have a few of my PDF fics... I have no problem with you converting the PDF ebook versions I did to Kindle as long as the copyright page is kept intact. Is that what you need?

[tonjavmoore]

Not a problem. It keeps all copyright information. I have the PDFs for the Collective Dreaming series, and I have several Reel Torchwood fics, but I don't remember if I have yours.

I'm willing to convert anything -- I'm only picky when it comes to my Kindle. :)

[idamus]

Does Calibre allow you to keep the name of the fic? I've found an online converter that convert all formats but when I transfer it to my Kindle I get a string of numbers/letters instead of the name :(

[tonjavmoore]

Yeah, that was my problem, too. Not only the title, but the author was messed up. I apparently authored the fics I converted.

Calibre fixes all that. You bring up the book or the PDF and you can change the metadata to what you want. I put series if the fic is part of the series (like the UnVerse and the Dragon Verse). You can change title, author, tags, date, etc. Then you can send it directly to your device. The MOBI format is universal for eReaders.

I'm cleaning up my Kindle now. It was a mess since I just put stuff on willy-nilly without regard for the metadata. If you don't know what metadata is, it's the data about the data. A PDF is data. The title and author are metadata (outside the data).

The only drawback I've found is that if you put a book back on your Kindle, you need to delete the old copy. But, guess what? Calibre does that for you if you tell it to. I don't know how I lived without it. Oh, and Calibre can communicate directly with a bunch of devices, and if you have a device that's not listed, you can download a plugin for it.

It's free.

http://calibre-ebook.com/

[idamus]

Oh goody, I'll have to look into this then, although the one I use now only changes the name of the fic on the Kindle and once I open the book everything is still there incl banners, I fixed this by naming my collection after the series (I've only done shorter series till now)
I'll be interested in you doing this by the way, I might find new fic ;)

[tonjavmoore]

The PDF banner is still there after the conversion, so don't worry about that. Calibre also generates covers if you want:

UnExpected

teachwriteslash

Book I of The UnVerse



You can add your own image, but so far I've only used the default one. With Calibre I can change it later if I want.

Once I've generated the cover, I change the name to "01 - UnExpected" before I put it on the Kindle, so I can keep the order straight. After I get it on the Kindle I add it to collections. This particular one is under three: My teachwriteslash collection, my Domestic Torchwood collection, and my UnVerse collection. I added a column for Collection(s) in Calibre so I can tell where something is on the Kindle.

I'm using the UnVerse as an example because I converted it first. No favoritism implied. I love all my fics; otherwise they wouldn't be on my Kindle. In case you were wondering.

You may be able to tell that I'm both lazy and anal. Conflicting loyalties. Scary.

[teachwriteslash]

You've gone the its easy to get forgiveness than permission route with me I see :-)

Seriously, I have no problem with it as long as my screen name, etc, is attached. I'd be interested in a repository myself!

[tonjavmoore]

:) Thanks.

Your screen name is definitely attached. Since I didn't have a PDF (except for UnPrepared) I made them myself. That shows the level of my desperation.

I'll get started on it this weekend!

[rift_bound]

If you need help with this, I'd be happy to work with you on it. I discovered Calibre about a month ago and it is so easy to convert PDF or other formats (like epub) to MOBI for Kindle. I'm not an author, but an avid reader and a librarian (a metadata librarian... aka cataloger, in fact!) so I'd be happy to help.

[tonjavmoore]

That's fantastic! I'll be preparing a web page this weekend and start the uploading. Isn't Calibre great? It's so easy to bring order out of the chaos my Kindle has been in. It was driving me bonkers.