The first two books in Julia Spencer-Fleming's cozy mystery series starring Clare Ferguson (a priest assigned to St. Alban's Episcopal Church in upstate NY) are available for free at Amazon. The fourth book in the series is only $6.99, but for some reason, they don't appear to have the third available in the Kindle store. Go figure! But, you don't want to miss out on the freebies.

http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&search-type=ss&index=digital-text&field-author=Julia%20Spencer-Fleming

Thanks so much for the link. I've read all the books in the series, so far, and was disappointed that they weren't available for Kindle - I wanted to catch-up before the new book was released.

Great find!

How do you learn about such things? Is there a mailing list, or did you just happen upon the info? (Going now to check out these books.)

The first two books in Julia Spencer-Fleming's cozy mystery series starring Clare Ferguson (a priest assigned to St. Alban's Episcopal Church in upstate NY) are available for free at Amazon.

Bought, the price was right. Thanks for the info!

I assume Clare is female... Episcopalians allow female priests, right?

BOb

They do.. my girlfriend is planning to be one.

Of course... me being Jewish complicates things. :Grins:

Thanks for the heads up... will check it out!

How do you learn about such things? Is there a mailing list, or did you just happen upon the info? (Going now to check out these books.) It was serendipity. I saw this post (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=24718) about a book for free from the Sony store. So, I went over to Amazon and searched the Kindle store for all books by this author. Saw that these two had excellent prices & bought them right away.

Why did I think one or more might be free at Amazon? Because a month ago, they offered a book for free that Tor was giving away. The trick is, if you hear about a free book anywhere else, check @ Amazon to see if they're playing along.

Thanks for the heads up, Elsi!

Anyone else have problems with the formatting of the second of these books? The font is different, or at least bolder, the normal spacing between the lines is gone, and page turning is slowwwww.

Jim

The dreaded Topaz strikes again!!!!

Has anyone seen Topaz/tpz/azw1 on any books other than the St. Martin's? I've only seen it on a couple of books, and they've all been St. Martin's. Just my taste in books, I guess.

Where's igorsk when you need him? :D :D

They do.. my girlfriend is planning to be one.

Of course... me being Jewish complicates things. :Grins:
It makes life interesting. I knew a couple, where she was an Orthodox Catholic priest, and he was a reform rabbi. They teamed up a lot on interfaith marriages and counseling, and what one didn't know, the other generally did. He's dead now, alas -- he succumbed to a sudden massive heart attack, after suffering a minor one, getting treatment, and making the lifestyle changes involved in preventing a recurrence. It was a huge shock to all who knew him.

She's really a Roman Catholic at heart, and would switch affiliations in a heartbeat if the RC church changed it's stance on ordaining women, but I don't see that happening.
______
Dennis

Bad news, Jim. I downloaded the samples of the other two books (3 and 4 in the series) and they were azw1 (topaz), too. On the good news side, though, I would have sworn that book 3 wasn't there yesterday.

I find that I normally read at size 2, sometimes switching to 3 later in the evening. With Topaz formatted books, I find the redraw time at size 2 to be unacceptable, but size 3 isn't terribly bad, just a little slower, so I read most Topaz books at 3.

[QUOTE=tlrowley;196119]Bad news, Jim. I downloaded the samples of the other two books (3 and 4 in the series) and they were azw1 (topaz), too. On the good news side, though, I would have sworn that book 3 wasn't there yesterday.

Damn. Doesn't make sense to me that you have an electronic device that supports a rapid redraw speed only to have it defeated by the formatting the publisher uses. I will send off email to Amazon complaining, and will also try to find address for St. Martins.

4-5 seconds to redraw every page is not acceptable and I also note that it really drains the battery. My library has the books so will use that resource for the other books in the series.

Jim

PDF versions of the books are available for download by filling out a form at the following link:

https://app.e2ma.net/app/view:Join/signupId:38474

I've asked Amazon to delete the Kindle versions from my Media Library and refund the money for the book I purchased that is part of the series.

Edit: I received an email confirmation that I was joining their mailing list but they have not yet provided a download link. I'll post it when I receive it, if I can, so no one else has to sign up for their list.

Edit2: Here ya go.

A Fountain Filled With Blood (http://hbpub.vo.llnwd.net/o16/video/olmk/jsf_ebooks/9780312995430.pdf)

In the Bleak Midwinter (http://hbpub.vo.llnwd.net/o16/video/olmk/jsf_ebooks/9780312288471.pdf)

Bad news, Jim. I downloaded the samples of the other two books (3 and 4 in the series) and they were azw1 (topaz), too. On the good news side, though, I would have sworn that book 3 wasn't there yesterday. Book 3 definitely wasn't available at Amazon on Friday when I posted the first message. If I like the first two, I'm glad that the rest of the series is available for the Kindle.


I find that I normally read at size 2, sometimes switching to 3 later in the evening. With Topaz formatted books, I find the redraw time at size 2 to be unacceptable, but size 3 isn't terribly bad, just a little slower, so I read most Topaz books at 3. I normally read at size 2 if there is adequate light. In low-light conditions, I move up to size 3. I played around with the second book (A Fountain Filled with Blood) for a little while. At font size 2, turning the page wasn't terribly slow ... just slower than with the built-in font. At font size 3, it's hardly noticeable that the page turn is slower.


4-5 seconds to redraw every page is not acceptable and I also note that it really drains the battery. My library has the books so will use that resource for the other books in the series. I'll have to pay attention to the battery load.


One would hope that a software update could improve the font management -- perhaps by caching the font in the Kindle's memory -- to make the page turns take place even faster. If Kindle owners will give Amazon and the publishers (and even the author if you can reach him or her) feedback when a book displays poorly, eventually someone should start paying attention.

There are a lot of people who are employed in book design, and a well designed book is a pleasure to read. Some books just won't work well if the medium limits the font choices or forces use of page images instead of a flowable format. Take a look at what Feedbooks has done with their ePub template (http://blog.feedbooks.com/?p=57 ). It's attractive. It's appealing. Publishers who are turning their nose up at eBooks might be more interested if they had more control over the presentation.

Although I agree that the pages are re-drawing slower with Topaz, I think that part of the problem is the changing rhythm - the slightly slower pages are interrupting my flow, and I haven't adjusted to it yet. You know how you instinctively learn when to press the next page button - that changes with the slower re-draw.

I'm glad you see the same differences in 2 vs. 3. It helps to know that I'm not imagining things.

This series is one of my favorites and I'll be buying the new one, regardless. I'm just not boycott material :).

This series is one of my favorites and I'll be buying the new one, regardless. I'm just not boycott material :). Personally, I think that one can swing more weight with Amazon by complaining about something you've bought instead of boycotting. But maybe that's just my personality.

I did send off email to St Martins Press and got a receipt acknowledgement, but nothing further so far.

I also sent email to Amazon and got a reply back this morning which completely missed the point - they didn't take the time to read the mail.

So I called and talked to an unctious-toned rep this morning who supposedly was on the Kindle Support team and he'd never heard of Topaz formatting. When I tried to tell him the effect it had and that it ended up undermining their hardware, he assured me that their engineering department reviewed all formatting and they must feel that it falls within permissible perimeters.

So, boycotting is the only solution!!:)

Jim

Jim,

Don't know if you've soured on St. Martin's/Julia Spencer-Fleming because of this, or not, but the good news is that the newest book is in standard Kindle/mobi format. Or at least the sample is, and I've never seen the sample and the actual book in different formats.

Tracey

Thanks for the info, Tracey. I haven't soured on the novels at all, just in the formatting of some of them.

I'll probably buy the latest one, but those formatted in Topaz I'll get from my library and read.

It'd be interesting to know why they've reverted to the normal Kindle formatting, wouldn't it.

Jim

Oh, to be a fly on the wall.... :D

The first two books in Julia Spencer-Fleming's cozy mystery series starring Clare Ferguson (a priest assigned to St. Alban's Episcopal Church in upstate NY) are available for free at Amazon. The fourth book in the series is only $6.99, but for some reason, they don't appear to have the third available in the Kindle store. Go figure! But, you don't want to miss out on the freebies.

http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&search-type=ss&index=digital-text&field-author=Julia%20Spencer-Fleming

Actually it's the fifth book in the series All Mortal Flesh that is missing. :) I won't spoil it for you, but I read a synopsis, and the 5th book is very important to the ongoing romance. So even though the 6th book is available as a Kindle edition, I don't want to read it before reading #5. The fifth is available in paperback form, but I've taken a vow not to buy anymore paper books unless they use a lot of color or pictures/photgraphs.

http://www.juliaspencerfleming.com/ shows the order of her books. I have emailed both her and the publisher to suggest they Kindle All Mortal Flesh, but have not received a reply.

I really liked these two free books, but I didn't like the Topaz version. As people said here, it was too slow. I even looked at fictionwise and they only have book 1 and 6. I assume all but those at amazon are topaz? If so I won't be buying them.

BOb

...
Go figure! But, you don't want to miss out on the freebies.
...


Hi Elsi, thanks for taking the time to let us know about these free books! :book2:

:offtopic:
The dreaded Topaz strikes again!!!!
...


Hi tlrowley, I looked at the thread about whether people will buy Topaz books or not. I'm still in the dark--what exactly IS Topaz? :chinscratch:

Regards,
R.L.

Actually it's the fifth book in the series All Mortal Flesh that is missing. :) I won't spoil it for you, but I read a synopsis, and the 5th book is very important to the ongoing romance. So even though the 6th book is available as a Kindle edition, I don't want to read it before reading #5. The fifth is available in paperback form, but I've taken a vow not to buy anymore paper books unless they use a lot of color or pictures/photgraphs.

http://www.juliaspencerfleming.com/ shows the order of her books. I have emailed both her and the publisher to suggest they Kindle All Mortal Flesh, but have not received a reply.
The fifth book is now available in Kindle format. I bought and read it last month. Having now read all 6 books in the series, I'm frustratedly waiting for the next book to be published.

Hi Elsi, thanks for taking the time to let us know about these free books! :book2:

:offtopic:


Hi tlrowley, I looked at the thread about whether people will buy Topaz books or not. I'm still in the dark--what exactly IS Topaz? :chinscratch:



Regards,
R.L.

Read about TPZ in the wiki.

Dale