Amazon Kindle

Very important Notice. Please read!

What's New in Version 3.9.2

This is a fix for a Kindle issue with the upcoming iOS7 OS upgrade that may cause customers to have to re-register and re-download books from Amazon. Please download and install - this is a required update before upgrading to iOS7.

Has anyone found a work around to this yet? It drives me so mad, especially when I'm reading dialogue. I actually returned a book once, because I thought the formatting was all wrong. Guess I should have got somebody to check. I'm a literature student so no lines between dialogue and stuff irritates me. Shouldn't complain though. We are so lucky with accessible ebooks these days.

I've noticed a couple issues when trying to read with a braille display that are pretty annoying. First of all, words seemed to be spaced strangely. What i mean is a space breaks up words making it seem like separate words. I've had it checked by a sighted person and they say the print appears normal. Second and most troublesome, sometimes when I'm reading and get to the end of a page it will jump back up to the top of that page instead of turning to the next. Also sometimes it goes to the next page before even being finished showing the text from the previous page. it leaves off a couple of lines. has anyone experienced either of these issues?

Does anyone know if the "real" page numbers show up in the Kindle iOS app, for those titles that support them? I don't see them on the books I'm looking at currently, but I don't know if these books include real page number information, so I'm just curious if anyone knows for sure if this feature is accessible.

I tried this and it didn't work. Anyone else?

Anyone else using kindle unlimited its basically a library for ten bucks a month you can check out ten books at a time and return them. the only problem I am having is determining is if a book is a kindle unlimited book or not like on one it ended up being a sample and on others they just didn't download. So I am not sure on what to do do I write amazon or what? also I will give the podcast a listen and the faq a good going going over because I didn't know they existed.

If you get to the browse menu, go down to
More to Explore Heading
Everything below there seems to be unlimited so you just pick the category you want.
You will find more categories link at the very bottom. You may also search for kindle unlimited.
I noticed there doesn’t seem to be a browse button in the latest version when you’re in a book or in your library. So maybe easier to search for kindle unlimited to get to the browse books area instead.

I typed in Raymond buckland and did a filter for kindle unlimited books and found 13 this is sad because none of them were the books I was looking for but I will talk to the publisher as well as amazon.

I forgot about filters.
Hope you can get your book.

Hello, my husband and I are considering downloading this app in order to have access to reading more books. My question is do you have to have had a Kindle first in order to be able to access and purchase books to read on the Kindle app? Or, can you simply download the app, register as a Kindle user, and search for and purchase kindle books? Since we would never use the Kindle, we would prefer the app. I would greatly appreciate any input. Thanks.

Hello everyone,
I'm running the latest version of iOS, and using a Braille Edge 40 from Hims. Whenever I am in a book, and attempt to pan to the next page, my display freezes up and stays on the previous page, while speech moves onto the next one. I'm using an iPhone 6S+ if that makes a difference. I would really appreciate any help anyone can give. Thanks so much! Ali

not sure if anyone else has had this issue or maybe its just me. When I read kindle books using voice-over it seems to generate a pause at the end of each line of text on the page which can be rather grating at times. Has anyone else experienced this and is there a way around it?

I've been trying to find a comprehensive list of keyboard commands for iphone kindle, without success. Amazom does have a keystroke guide for Windows computer and for Mac users. I've purchased the book mentioned above that lists gestures that iphone users can use. However, I can't find a list of key strokes that I can use in place of the gestures.

Hello. I was wondering if anyone had ever tried reading college text books using the Amazon Kindle app. I want to know how VoiceOver handles the figures and illustrations that sometimes are in text books. Bookshare and Learning Ally do not have the books I need for this semester, so I was wondering if Kindle would be a good option.
Thank you.

I use my echo to read the kindle book. Alexa does nice job reading the book. I go to my alexa app and select kindle to read my book.

Hi,
Has anyone found an effective way to do this?

Hi,
I have the exact same questions. I will be starting college in the fall, and may get my textbooks from Amazon, for reading in the Kindle app.
It disappoints me greatly, that candle on the Mac is not, and never has been, accessible with voiceover.
Every time I try to talk to Amazon about this, they act like they don’t know what I’m talking about.

I tweeted them twice about this, and they have yet to answer me.

Does anyone have any ideas as to how we could beef up our advocacy in this area?

Hi!
Is there a way to read footnotes more quickly?

Hi there,

Regarding the Kindle app, does anyone know how to remove the notebook view? Sometimes when I’m searching for books and find something I like, I exit the app, go to Goodreads, search for the book, and add it to my “Want to Read” shelf. But when I return to the Kindle app, I get a message saying that VoiceOver might not work properly in notebook view, and it kicks me out of the application, sending me back to the homepage. There’s no way to close that section and return to where I left off. Even if I leave the app on the book’s information page, when I come back, the same thing happens. I’ve searched the settings, but there’s no option to disable this notebook view. It also tells me I don’t have any notebooks created, which makes it even more confusing and frustrating.

Because of this, when I find a book I like on the Kindle app, I have to add it to my Amazon wishlist instead. Then, when I’m done searching, I have to go back through the list, add each book to Goodreads, and then remove them from my Amazon list, which is time-consuming.

Another issue is that both Goodreads and Amazon lack proper filtering when searching for books. There’s no way to filter books by series, so if I could see only the first book in every series listed, that would make browsing much easier. Right now, if a series has four or more books, they all show up in the search results, making it difficult to find the starting point. It would be helpful to have an option to display only the first book in each series—so if I search for “Revival Trilogy,” I’d see the first book labeled as “Revival (Revival Trilogy #1)” instead of every single book in the series appearing at once.

Additionally, book discovery on both platforms is restrictive because searches rely on exact tags. If I search for something like “sci-fi trilogy,” I might get results, but only because “trilogy” is in the title. However, books with four or more installments don’t follow a consistent naming pattern, so they don’t always show up. Also, tags on Amazon and Goodreads work in a way that limits search results—if I search for “dystopian fiction,” “sci-fi,” and “steampunk” together, instead of showing books that match any of these genres, the search only shows books that fit all of them at once. This makes it harder to discover books unless you already know exactly what to type in.

Overall, the entire process is confusing, and I’d really appreciate any tips on how to make book searching and tracking easier.

Hi,

You can go into the More tab at the bottom of the Kindle app, and from there you can find Notebooks. I believe you can only create notebooks with a Kindle Scribe device. However, you can access the Notebooks from the Kindle app. As for getting that message about VoiceOver not supporting it when you are trying to go to your home screen, after searching for something in the Kindle app, I believe this may be a bug, I too have experienced it a few times, and it can be frustrating. Unfortunately, I've yet to find a way to disable this.

With regards to book series, when searching for books, and you happen to find a book that is part of a series, if you double tap on that book title, and then navigate from within the book details screen until you find a button that says something like book 1 of x, double tapping that button will take you to a page with the entire series. you can navigate by heading until you find a heading labeled "Books in this series". From here, you can navigate to each book individually, add them to your library, or add them to your list if they are not part of Kindle Unlimited, etc. it's definitely not as streamlined as it could be but it's better than nothing I suppose.

Hope you find this information useful. 🙂

I'm going to start reading my books with the alexa app until the Braille display issues are fixed. Voice-over reads books but does not give access to all information on the Braille display. This isn't good!

Hi guys,

So I’ve got a question (well, a couple, actually). I recently got a prepaid Visa gift card and used it to activate a Kindle Unlimited membership—got two months for just $0.99, and I’m super grateful for that. I usually go for prepaid cards when subscribing to services so I don’t get overcharged or end up forgetting to cancel something. I read what I can, cancel when I’m done, and then reactivate when I’ve got a fresh list of books to get through. Anyway, here’s what I wanted to ask:
First question: When I’m reading a Kindle Unlimited book, I know some of them come with audio via WhisperSync. If the book has an audio version, how exactly do I access it? Do I need to download the Audible app to use that feature, or can I access the audio directly through the Kindle app? Not totally sure how that works, so if anyone knows, I’d appreciate the help.
Second question: When I’m reading on the Kindle app, I’ve tried the built-in assistive reader, but honestly, it feels kind of choppy. I’ve found that the Speak Screen feature on my iPhone actually reads a bit smoother. The Kindle app just doesn’t give me the same fluid reading experience—even when I use their built-in assistive reader, it doesn’t sound as fast or natural. Even at 3.5x speed, it still feels slower than the 2x speed I use on Speak Screen with Apple Books. When I use Speak Screen on Kindle, it keeps stopping after a few paragraphs, and I can’t seem to get it to start reading from where it left off. That’s been super frustrating.
So yeah, I’m wondering—is there a way to make the Speak Screen feature from the iPhone sound better when used on the Kindle app, or to make the Kindle app’s built-in assistive reader sound less choppy? Both of them just don’t quite hit the same quality. If there’s a workaround to improve that, I’d love to know. Also, is there any way to send Kindle Unlimited books to the Apple Books app so I can read them there instead? I know the services are totally different, and I’m technically just borrowing the books through Kindle Unlimited, not owning them, but if there’s a workaround or trick for this, I’d love to know. Thanks in advance for any help!

Hi,

Anytime I have ever purchased audio, using the discount feature you get once you have purchased a Kindle book, that usually just shows up on my Audible app. There is possibly a way to have it go directly to Kindlel, but I have not really ever tried. I’m fine with the audio going onto Audible. Helps me keep track of things.
As for reading the books, I am a fan of using the Amazon Alexa app. For me that has been the best reading experience. If you have had the opportunity to listen to an audible book that has been narrated with Virtual Voice, you’ll get an idea of what I am talking about.
Finally, I do not think you can listen to Kindle books on the Apple Books app.

Hope that answers some of your questions at least. :-)

Hi,
So, you can just use VoiceOver to read a Kindle book. You don't need that reader thing within the Kindle. Didn't even know about that feature. Just swipe down with two fingers for continuous reading, and it'll turn the pages automatically. You can swipe with 3 fingers left to go forward a page and three fingers right to go back a page if you need to. When reading with VoiceOver, some people have reported long pauses between paragraphs, this doesn't bother me personally, and I don't even notice it now. I don't think the pauses are long at all, but that's a personal preference. I hate reading with Alexa, and I've never tried using Speak Screen, VoiceOver with the Daniel voice works fine for me. As for the audio companion to a book, you need to buy the book first through the audible app or website. But whether you need the Audible app on your phone, I'm not sure, because if you want Whispersync, you download the audio companion from within the Kindle app itself, and you just hit 'play' or something within the Kindle app. Of course you need to have the same username for your Amazon and Audible accounts. I got my Audible account before Amazon bought Audible, but I ended up merging my Amazon and Audible accounts because it's just easier. I get recommendations on Audible sometimes based on what I've been reading on Kindle etc.. You can't send your Kindle books to Apple books. Kindle books are DRM protected by default, and so can't be opened in any other app. Hope that helps.

Thank you for the answers so far. This is very helpful.
OK, so how do I read with the Amazon Alexa app? How does that work? I have seen virtual voice around, and it seems pretty cool. Now that I'm on the Kindle unlimited membership, are there any titles that you could recommend that has this feature? I would love to be able to try it out for sure

Open your Alexa app on your iPhone.
Tap the “speak to Alexa“ button in the bottom right corner.
Say something like “Play Harry Potter on Kindle”
So long that the book is in your Kindle library, it should just start playing it. You have access to a couple of voice controls as well. For example you could say things like go back, go forward, go back X number of minutes, like go back 15 minutes, same with go forward. You can also jump to the beginning or end of the book. I think there’s a few other voice commands, but the ones I mentioned above are what I use more than anything else.
If you’re wearing some kind of headset, you can also use typical media controls like play/pause, skip back and skip forward, etc.
Finally, and because this is Alexa, you can do this with Firestick/TVs, echo devices, and of course the Alexa app on your iOS/iPadOS devices.
One more thing to note, any Kindle e-book that supports screen readers you can use Alexa to read. A rule of thumb, if VoiceOver can read it, Alexa can read it.

HTH.

How do I get the book to speed up? When it starts reading, and I tell it to speed up, it says that my device does not support playback settings, but I'm not sure what that means. Also, could I directly download the books from the Amazon Alexa app, instead of going on the Amazon website? Thanks.

Yes, you can purchase books through Alexa, and I believe that will put them in your library. You do have to enable purchasing by voice, and that is something I am not really sure how to go about doing. I believe it can be done through your Amazon account though.
As for speeding up, or slowing down your books via Alexa, just say, “Alexa faster”, or, “Alexa slower”“, while your book is playing.

*Edited to add that you can actually enable voice purchasing through the Alexa app. Go to the app settings, then account settings, then enable voice purchasing.*