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Old Yesterday, 12:10 PM   #1
ArizonaGuy
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What do I do with this?
I got one of those Amazon emails listing book bargains. One of the listed books is by one of my favorite authors (John Scalzi) and is listed as both being free and available as an ePub/pdf download. I guess no DRM. So I bought it, if bought is the appropriate word for a free book.

But when I pressed the Download ePub/PDF link all I got was a folder structure with the root being ebook-content and the contents of the folder being a series of additional folders containing various files - images, xhtml files and others. The xhtml files appear to be the book contents but how can I put them back together as an eBook? And why did I get this structure instead of a straight ePub or PDF file? I tried using Adobe Digital Editions and Calibre, but no luck, at least copying the root folder into the apps.

Has anyone else seen this in an ePub/PDF download from the Amazon website?

ADDED:

OK.

The xhtml files are the contents of the book, and I can load each one of the 13 items into Calibre and convert it to an eBook (or pdf or txt or ...) and I suppose I could then load each part into some software to combine them, but is there some easier way to convert all of them into a single book rather than into 13 separate books which then have to be combined?
Last edited by ArizonaGuy; Yesterday at 12:18 PM.
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Old Yesterday, 12:18 PM   #2
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Perchance are you using a Mac and Safari? If so, you will need to disable the "Open safe files after downloading" option.
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Old Yesterday, 01:08 PM   #3
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Perchance are you using a Mac and Safari? If so, you will need to disable the "Open safe files after downloading" option.
Yes, I am using a Mac and Safari.

Thanks. I will give that a try. It has to be easier than trying to convert all 13 files and then put them back together again.
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Old Yesterday, 01:21 PM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ArizonaGuy View Post
I got one of those Amazon emails listing book bargains. One of the listed books is by one of my favorite authors (John Scalzi) and is listed as both being free and available as an ePub/pdf download. I guess no DRM. So I bought it, if bought is the appropriate word for a free book.
i assume you are referring to Sneak Peek for Monsters of Ohio. That is a free sample being marketed as a separate book. Seems like a sleazy idea to me.
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Old Yesterday, 01:25 PM   #5
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Well, that was interesting.

I tried unchecking the Open Safe Files After Downloading option. It downloaded a zip file but I was unable to open it and only part of the error message displayed so I could not see what was the real problem.

I also have Chrome on my Mac and tried it. Repeat of above.

I also have FireFox on my Mac and tried it. This time I actually got an ePub, but my ebook reader could not open it because, it said, the book was badly formatted. Opened it in Calibre and saved it as an ePub and, viola, I got a readable ePub.

Thank you for the help because I would probably not have tried the other browsers, at least not immediately.
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Old Yesterday, 01:33 PM   #6
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DRM-free EPUBs from Amazon download in Chrome as zip files for me. Changing the file extension from .zip to .epub makes them readable.
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Old Yesterday, 02:25 PM   #7
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Monsters of Ohio won't be out until November 3, 2026.
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Old Yesterday, 04:35 PM   #8
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Quote:
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Monsters of Ohio won't be out until November 3, 2026.
But the extended Sneak Peek for Monsters of Ohio is out now.

B0GXGYD71P
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Old Today, 05:19 AM   #9
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But the extended Sneak Peek for Monsters of Ohio is out now.

B0GXGYD71P
But it's not a proper book.
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Old Today, 10:35 AM   #10
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i assume you are referring to Sneak Peek for Monsters of Ohio. That is a free sample being marketed as a separate book. Seems like a sleazy idea to me.
Yeah, but it is free so it is hard to complain about the cost.
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Old Today, 10:38 AM   #11
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DRM-free EPUBs from Amazon download in Chrome as zip files for me. Changing the file extension from .zip to .epub makes them readable.
Yes. That worked, at least one of my eBook readers could then open the book, although the others could not and complained about the format being corrupted.

But that is just weird. Why would the item download as a zip file if it was in ePub format?
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Old Today, 12:24 PM   #12
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But that is just weird. Why would the item download as a zip file if it was in ePub format?
Web browser supplier hubris.
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Old Today, 12:47 PM   #13
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epub files are just archives like zip files. You can open any epub as an archive for example with 7-zip.
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Old Today, 01:34 PM   #14
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epub files are just archives like zip files. You can open any epub as an archive for example with 7-zip.
That makes me wonder if 7-zip will load this downloaded file. The built-in unzipper on my Mac would not. I guess I will download 7-zip and see how that works out.

UPDATE:

Well, I guess not since the only Mac versions are for very old chips and probably would not work with the new Apple Silicon systems.
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