K4 Mac or PC kindle for PC - Where the books reside

[sophieturgeon]

Hello, I don't have a kindle. So when purchasing books from amazon, I use Kindle for WIndows 8. I would like to be able to include these books in my Calibre library and eventually link Calibre to CC using my new tablet. Of course with the kindle books. Can anyone help me? I would also like to keep the books I purchased in my own library and not leave them with Amazon. After all, I paid for those books... Thanks!

[crane3]

For win8.x, it's at "c:\users\signon name\Documents\My Kindle Content\.

However, you can also use the "option" from the dropdown & set the library to another drive or partition; the books will then be delivered to the place you had set.

[Byrdie]

Don't know if there's been major changes to the Library structure in Windows 8, but in Windows 7, Kindle For PC creates a folder called My Kindle Content in the Documents folder (C:\Users\Home\Documents). That's where it puts the books, which also tend to have really weird names instead of proper titles -- for example B00A1N2F5Y_EBOK.azw instead of "Deadly Magic (A Grace Holliday Cosy Mystery)". So try looking for anything called My Kindle Content on your system and your books will be in that.

Remember to first pay a visit to Apprentice Alf if you want to back up anything that has DRM, which many Amazon ebooks are often infested with. With the latest version of his Tools and an updated Calibre, you should be good to go.

[eschwartz]

Do not use Kindle for Windows 8 -- that is a metro app and like all the other Kindle apps, the DeDRM tools do not work on it.

Install Kindle for PC, a regular old Windows program which runs on Windows 7/Vista/XP and which the DeDRM tools work on.

If you go to the Amazon product page the Windows Store button currently gives you the Win7 installer, use that instead of the one which came from the Metro Store (or perhaps preinstalled).


As stated above, your books will be in C:\Users\<username>\Documents\My Kindle Content\ -- however, that only applies to the Win7 program, as the metro app will store them in obfuscated app storage.
Files will be named "{ASIN}_EBOK.azw" but calibre will extract the metadata so you don't have to care.

What many people do is set calibre to auto-add books from the My Kindle Content folder. After import, the original copies get deleted (so calibre doesn't endlessly reimport them) and you simply download just the books you want to add to calibre. If you have no other devices, Amazon will automatically queue purchased books to be sent to Kindle4PC, so you can just open Kindle4PC and let stuff download into calibre.
This is one of the most streamlined download-from-Amazon-to-calibre setups you can get.


(And for the random rant of the day, Metro is one of the stupidest things Microsoft has done, and there is plenty to choose from. Sigh.)

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Do not use Kindle for Windows 8 -- that is a metro app and like all the other Kindle apps, the DeDRM tools do not work on it.

This is true, but the OP specifically said "Kindle for PC", which is not the Metro App. The information given in the earlier replies is correct for Kindle for PC.

[sophieturgeon]

I have followed all your input and it worked very well. The major problem was kindle for Windows 8. I was going in the right directory, but since it was a metro version, nothing made sense. I went into other directories and what I was mostly finding were fragmented files I knew were related to the Kindle books, I just didn't know what to do with them. I did change the input directory in Kindle. I will also download new books to Calibre in the same directory so they are added automatically.

All that is left is to understand "deDRMing" and you gave me an area to find this as well. Also building the library of over 2500 books using my customized metadata stuff.

Thank you all for all of your help.! Happy New Year!!!

[Mike L]

I had the same question a couple of years ago. For what it's worth, I wrote a short blog post which summarised the information I found. The relevant point was:

Perhaps the worst feature is that your books no longer exist as separate physical files in your computer. .... the app now stores all your books in an internal database which is inaccessible to the user - in much the same way that iTunes stores your music tracks.

That was true when I wrote the above in 2013. If it no longer applies, I'd welcome a correction.

Mike

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by HarryT

This is true, but the OP specifically said "Kindle for PC", which is not the Metro App. The information given in the earlier replies is correct for Kindle for PC.

They can be easily confused (by those who have not learned better yet), and I was clued in by the OP's reference to "Kindle for Windows 8".
As the OP confirmed.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

They can be easily confused (by those who have not learned better yet), and I was clued in by the OP's reference to "Kindle for Windows 8".
As the OP confirmed.

Fair enough.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by sophieturgeon

I have followed all your input and it worked very well. The major problem was kindle for Windows 8. I was going in the right directory, but since it was a metro version, nothing made sense. I went into other directories and what I was mostly finding were fragmented files I knew were related to the Kindle books, I just didn't know what to do with them. I did change the input directory in Kindle. I will also download new books to Calibre in the same directory so they are added automatically.

All that is left is to understand "deDRMing" and you gave me an area to find this as well. Also building the library of over 2500 books using my customized metadata stuff.

Thank you all for all of your help.! Happy New Year!!!

You're welcome, and Happy New Year!
Feel free to discuss your metadata handling in the calibre forum and ask for advice if you need it. Particularly make sure you are using plugboards.

P.S. To get you started on your journey, this website gives the master rundown on De/DRM: http://apprenticealf.wordpress.com
Note: It is against forum policy to discuss here in detail or offer guidance, but the blog already has everything you need. Do post in the comments there if anything is unclear.