[BetterRed]

@Don Edwards - you don't have to retain the format files in the calibre folders.

You might put new books there for the purposes of creating the catalogue entry, updating the metadata, or doing a conversion etc. After which you could delete the format file from library. You could put a link into Comments or a Custom comments-like column to the book in your B&N folder structure or you could wrangle a Windows shortcut to the B&N book folder into calibre book folder.

The cataloguing features are driven from calibres database not the book folders. You cant get rid of the author and book folders because calibre uses the cover.jpg files, and it needs to have a metadata.opf file for the purpose of doing a database restore.

Some folks have two libraries one where they process new books to get the metadata up to scratch i.e. a 'preparation library' and an 'operational library'.

BR