I am going to set this message up to go out every couple of months: if you’ve seen it before and know what I’m talking about, or if you’re just plain ‘ole tired of seeing it don’t worry – I’ll be back with a new post soon.

There seems to be a Kindle problem for a lot of folks – that is, what do you need to do if (a) your Kindle or Fire Tablet freezes up, or (b) you’ve ordered a book, app or anything else and it never seems to download.

You may need to write this down, or try to memorize it, because if it happens to you I’m willing to bet you won’t remember unless you’ve reset your Kindle a few times!

If this happens to you, you will need to reboot your Kindle.

Here is how you reboot an e-Ink Kindle:

1. Click the “Home” button to get back to your home screen.
2. Click the “Menu” button, and select “Settings.”
3. You will see several options, but “reboot” is not one of those options. Press the “Menu” button again.
4. You will have several options, but choose and click the “Restart” button.
5. Alternatively, some Kindles are different – say the Paperwhite. Use the same instructions for the Kindle Fire below.

Here is how you reboot a Fire Tablet:

1. Press and hold the power button for 20 seconds, then release the power button.
2. The Fire will turn off.
3. After the Fire has turned off, press the power button once and release it to restart the Fire.

Once you reboot your Kindle or Fire Tablet, it could take about 1-2 minutes to reboot. Make sure your wireless is on, and the Kindle will go look in the Amazon store to see what is pending to be downloaded and viola! You should be back in business. If you ever need to restart your Kindle, I hope this helps!

Michael

 

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Have you ever had your Kindle (or Fire) screen “freeze” or become unresponsive? It can happen for a variety of reasons, but the probable cause is a low battery.

If this happens to you, try the simple step of plugging it into your charger for a few minutes; although it may sound obvious, please make sure the charging indicator light is on. That should do it but, if it doesn’t, there is one more thing you can do before you break down and either smack your Kindle or call Amazon’s Kindle Customer Service: try resetting it. To reset it at this point, slide (or press, as appropriate for your Kindle or Fire) and hold the power switch for 30 seconds or longer then release it.

Your Kindle should then spend a little bit of time resetting, and you should be back in business! If not, unfortunately, it is probably worth a call to Amazon’s Kindle Customer Service department.

A friend of mine’s Paperwhite recently had a screen freeze and it was fairly frustrating as she was in the middle of a book, and a simple reset as described above fixed the issue. Yes, I was the customer service phone call in this case….

Hope that helps!

Michael

 

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Remember when you used to read paper books and after you had read one you would loan it to a friend to read?  Or, maybe they would loan you a book?  Amazon has a book lending feature for Kindle books you and your friends / family can take advantage of but, like most things in life, there are a couple of catches to this feature:

• If you lend a book to someone, it can only be loaned for a 14 day period.
• You can only loan a book once, and only once, so make sure you pick the “right” person to loan a book.
• All books are not lendable, as there are many publishers who are blocking the feature in order to get an incremental dollar.
• If you loan a book out to someone, you cannot read it on your Kindle at the same time (it disappears).

You can tell if a book is eligible for lending on the book’s detail page – just scroll down to the “Product Details” section on the Kindle book page.  There is a bold-faced legend called “Lending:” and it will tell you if the lending feature is enabled (it’s in the “Product Details”  section.

On the other hand, a couple of years ago I read the late Wayne Rogers’ book called Make Your Own Rules (I thought it was outstanding) and it does not support the lending feature: click here to see what I mean.  If you scroll down to the “Product Details” section of the book’s web page, “Lending” line item says “Not Enabled.”

How to Lend a Book

If you already own the book, you can go to the Manage Your Content and Devices section of the Amazon web page (you may need to sign in to your Amazon account again) and look at your Kindle orders.  Click on the icon underneath the “Actions” column next to each title (on my computer it is a small grey square with three dots about two-thirds of the way down): if the lending feature is enabled, you will see a button titled “Loan This Title” in the popup for each individual book book.

Alternatively, if you have purchased the book, go to the book’s page on the Amazon website: right above the title line, it will show you a box just above the titles name telling you when you purchased the book, and just below that line will be a “Loan This Title” text link for you to click.  If you want to lend the book to someone, initiate from either the Manage Your Content and Devices section of the Amazon website or on the book’s web page.

You don’t have to own a Kindle to be able to read a book that was loaned to you, as the feature is also available for people to read on the Kindle for PC or other Kindle applications.

After you click the Loan This Title button or text link, your browser will next open up a form to input the borrower’s name, email address, and a personal message within the email notification.  The recipient will be notified of the loan via the email address you input into the Amazon form.  The recipient has seven days to either accept or reject the loan: if the loan is not accepted after seven days, you will be able to loan it again or read it on your Kindle.  If the recipient already owns the book, or if the book isn’t available in their country due to copyright restrictions, the borrower cannot accept the loan; if that is the case, you will get the book back available to you after the seven day period.

Receiving a Book Loan

If you have received an email notification of a book loan (it will be titled “A Loaned Book For You”) and you accept it, you can download the book to your Kindle or the Kindle reading application such as the Kindle for PC or iPad.  After you press accept, you will have 14 days to complete the book.  After the 14 day period is over, the book will disappear from your Kindle: if you haven’t finished it yet and want to complete it, or read it again at a later date, you will have to purchase the book or have a different friend loan it to you.

Once you press accept, you will then be prompted to login to your Amazon account – in other words, the lender does not need to know your registered Kindle email address in order to loan you a book (my Amazon-registered email address is different than my main “correspondence” email address).

Once that is completed, you will then select the Kindle device to download the book: if you don’t have a Kindle or Kindle application, that’s okay as you will then be directed to the steps to download a free Kindle reading application (side note; pretty smart of Amazon in order to get more Kindle readers out there).

Just remember these dates and other items:

• Once you receive a lending notification email, you have seven days to accept it.
• Once you accept the loaned book, you have 14 days to complete it.
• As a lender, you can only loan a title once – and once only – so if multiple people are interested in the same book make sure you loan it to the “right” person.
• You can only loan books: magazines and newspapers are not eligible for the loaning program.

Here are some frequently asked questions on what you can and can’t do with the lending feature.  I can’t take credit for this part as it comes from the Amazon website.

As the lender, can I read the book while it is out on loan?

Once you initiate a Kindle book loan, you will not be able to read the book until the loan period has ended, after which your access will automatically be restored.

Once your notification has been sent, a reminder message will appear on the Home screen of your Kindle or Kindle reading app, indicating that the book is on loan and cannot be read until the loan has ended.

During the loan period the book will still remain visible in your Archived Items folder, but you will be unable to redownload the title.

Will I be notified before the book loan expires?

Yes. Three days before the end of the 14-day loan period we will send borrowers a courtesy reminder e-mail about the loan expiration.  Once the loan period has ended, an e-mail notification will be sent to both the book lender and borrower. The lender can then access the book again through their Archived Items and Manage Your Content and Devices.

The borrower will receive a notice on the Home screen of their device indicating that the loan has ended.  The borrower will still be able to view the title from their Archived Items folder as well, but selecting the title will bring up a reminder that the loan has ended and provide a link to purchase the item.

If the recipient is finished with the loaned book and wishes to return it, they can do so from the Your Orders section of Manage Your Kindle.  Here’s how:

1. Click the icon symbol next to the loaned title and underneath the “Actions” header.
2. Click the Delete this Title
3. Click Yes in the pop-over window to confirm the return.

After initiating a return the reading rights will be restored to the owner of the book. The owner will also receive an e-mail confirmation of the return.

How do I view the status of my loan?

You can view the status of a Kindle book loan from the Manage Your Content and Devices page. Click on the icon next next to any title (and underneath the Actions column) to view more details about any book that you’ve loaned or borrowed.

If you’ve loaned out the book, you’ll see the loan date listed, as well as whether the loan is pending, the expiration date of an accepted loan, or the returned date.

Borrowers will be able to see how much longer a loan is available, or if it has ended.

What happens to my notes and highlights?

The lender’s notes and highlights are not visible to the borrower during a Kindle books loan. When the book is returned, the same notes and highlights will appear in the book as before the loan was initiated.

The borrower of a Kindle book loan is also able to make notes and highlights in loaned books. These will not be visible to the lender at the end of the loan period. If a borrower purchases the same title after the loan has ended, any notes and highlights made in the loaned book will be retained in the purchased version.

That’s all I have for now, and happy lending!

Michael

 

 

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Here’s a quick reminder – if I or anyone else tells you about a book being offered for free or discounted on the Amazon Kindle website and you are interested, please jump on it immediately. Don’t wait a few days or even a couple of hours, or you may see the book being offered for sale vs. what you thought was free! I’ve seen it happen many times over the years.

Why does that happen? Sometimes there is a glitch to the Amazon system, an author may have forgot to set the book’s promotion on the Amazon website, or who knows?

Bottom line here is don’t wait – log on to the website frequently (www.fkbt.com) or check your email shortly after 8:00 a.m. Central time for the daily digest if you are subscribed to the free daily email. Grab them now as once the book is yours, no matter if you paid nothing or $9.99 for a book, it is yours forever!

I should say something similar about books discounted to 99 cents: the author, for example, has told me their book(s) will be discounted for a particular day and I set the posts up in advance. The same issue that can cause titles to not be free can also apply to the discounting for a particular day. Please make sure you verify the pricing on the Amazon website before you click the “buy” button.

Hope that helps!

Michael

 

Here’s a quick reminder – if I or anyone else tells you about a book being offered for free or discounted on the Amazon Kindle website and you are interested, please jump on it immediately. Don’t wait a few days or even a couple of hours, or you may see the book being offered for sale vs. what you thought was free! I’ve seen it happen many times over the years.

Why does that happen? Sometimes there is a glitch to the Amazon system, an author may have forgot to set the book’s promotion on the Amazon website, or who knows?

Bottom line here is don’t wait – log on to the website frequently (www.fkbt.com) or check your email shortly after 8:00 a.m. Central time for the daily digest if you are subscribed to the free daily email. Grab them now as once the book is yours, no matter if you paid nothing or $9.99 for a book, it is yours forever!

I should say something similar about books discounted to 99 cents: the author, for example, has told me their book(s) will be discounted for a particular day and I set the posts up in advance. The same issue that can cause titles to not be free can also apply to the discounting for a particular day. Please make sure you verify the pricing on the Amazon website before you click the “buy” button.

Hope that helps!

Michael

 

Wi-Fi Setup on Your Kindle

Sometimes, I am surprised at what questions I receive, but I take a step back and realize there are a lot of new Kindle owners out there who haven’t owned a Kindle (or may not be as up on technology) as long as some of the other Kindle owners have.

Let’s suppose for example you have, or are considering purchasing, a new Kindle that is WiFi only. Being WiFi only means (a) you are not able to connect to the Internet or Amazon’s services via the cellular network, and (b) you must have an active WiFi connection in order to access Amazon’s service. Sure, you can still download books to your Kindle via the USB cord, but you will need some type of over-the-air connection if you choose not to go the USB route.

If you don’t have a wireless system in your home and want one, it is fairly easy to do (if I can figure it out, anyone can). However, that is not the purpose of this post – if you don’t know how to do it I would recommend going to a Best Buy or similar store as they can help you out quickly.

If you have a wireless system setup in your home, or have access to one at work, Starbucks, etc. you can quickly setup your wireless connection to your WiFi Kindle; you can do the same if you have the new Kindle that has both wireless and WiFi – you will just need to establish the connection. Here is how I do it on my Kindle Paperwhite:

• Press or tap the top portion of the screen to get to the main menu options.
• Press the “Settings” option.
• Press the “All Settings” option.
• Press the “Wi-Fi & Bluetooth” option.
• Select the “Wi-Fi Networks” option.
• You will see a list of available WiFi networks. If you don’t, select the “rescan” option.
• If you see the one you want – select it by tapping the name of it..
• If it asks you for a password, enter it at that time. If, for example, you are at a Starbucks or other business that offers free Internet access and it still asks you for a password, ask one of the employees: I’m sure they will be happy to tell you (although you may have to purchase a cup of coffee or something).

Hope that helps!

Michael

 

 

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I thought it was an appropriate time to remind you of the free sample option Amazon has with the Kindle program: consider it like going to the bookstore (well, that is if there are many of them still open these days) and turning a few pages before buying it. You can get a free sample of a Kindle book – usually a few chapters to just a couple of pages – to try out and see if the book is something you are interested in prior to buying. I use the feature quite a bit, as I get extremely annoyed in shelling out money for a book and realizing about 10% of the way through it I think it’s not for me.

If I am interested in the book, I will do one of two things:

• If it is a free book and I am even remotely interested in it, I will download the whole thing. What do I have to lose? Nothing (e.g., it’s free!). Should I complain because I don’t like it or the genre? No. Again, it’s free – why the sense of entitlement? Over the past several years I get complaints emailed to me from time-to-time about too much of one genre or the other being available for free. Why? I don’t know – a publisher or independent author is making it available for free which sounds great to me. Like I said before, you don’t have anything to lose! Maybe these folks should redirect their energies and complain directly to the dysfunctional US Congress – both parties – about getting their act together and behaving as adults…but that’s another blog post for another venue.
• If it is not a free book (gasp!), I usually will download the sample in order to see if I like the first couple of pages, then I will make my buying decision. Why waste money sight unseen when I can have a sample downloaded to my Kindle for free?

I bring this up as I don’t want any of you to forget about the free sample option. I have a separate folder / category devoted to samples on my Kindle, and I select and download 3-4 samples at a time when I see something after trolling through the Amazon store, but I may not check the sample out until later. Why wait so long? Usually, it is because I am in the middle of another book – I’m not one of those people who can multitask between three and four books at the same time. When I’m reading a book I’m usually pretty absorbed and get deep into the story, characters, etc. and can look up at the clock and realize three hours have quickly passed.

So, how do you find / download the free Kindle sample? Go to any Kindle book available for sale – not free books, as Amazon doesn’t send a free sample of a free book – on Amazon’s website and on the right-hand side of the page you will see another icon titled “Send a free sample.” Click that button – if you have multiple Kindles, please make sure you have the correct Kindle listed in the drop-down menu. If you are looking at a book via shopping directly on your Kindle, one of the options is to check out the free sample, click that item and the sample will be delivered to you.

With the free samples, plus the books on my Kindle now, I should be set for a long time…

Hope that helps!

Michael

 

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I just wanted to have a quick follow-up to a tip I posted on Tuesday about an idea / trick you could use if you lost your Kindle (if you missed it or want to read it again, you can click here).

I made a few references, assuming people understood what I was talking about, but didn’t stop to think we’ve had quite a few new subscribers come aboard recently and may not have seen previous posts; in other words, I received a few emails asking “what does <insert topic here> mean?”

Here were the top two questions I received:

• How do I create a collection? You can read about one way of doing it if you click here.
• What is the email address for my Kindle? You can read all about it, and how you can set yours up, if you click here.

 

Hope that helps!

Michael

 

It’s been a while since I have sent out a tip – in this case, I didn’t think of this one but it was sent to me by long-time blog reader Penny Parker.  Here is what she had to say about how to protect your Kindle if it is lost or stolen where you can provide the information prominently with the hope that whoever finds it will consider returning it:

I created a “collection” called “00 please read this if you find this Kindle”. By putting “00” in the front of this title it will automatically go to the first item in the list of contents. Then I sent myself a personal document called “read this” to the email address for my Kindle Paperwhite and had it converted to Kindle format (by putting “convert” in the email subject line). The message simply said that I own this Kindle, my name, how to reach me by email or mobile phone, and that I would gladly pay a reward for its return. And I close with “thank you.”

Thank you, Penny for passing this on!  If you have a tip you think others would find helpful, please send it on to me (michael at fkbt dot com) and it may appear here on the blog!

Michael