Last Read Location on Sideloaded eBooks on Kindle Reading Apps Don't Work

[Amogh Harish]

I Googled around, but I couldn't find any recent and relevant thread about this issue. A few months prior, I had sideloaded this eBook I had acquired. I generally read on my Android device and my iPod back then and with the calibre conversion method, I could sync the last read position with all my sideloaded books.

I recently acquired an old BlackBerry running OS 7.1 and I really liked the idea of reading an eBook on it. It had been almost 4 months since I had last used the Kindle reading apps and once I had installed the dedicated BlackBerry app, I sideloaded an eBook in *.mobi format on the BlackBerry. I could read and everything worked well. After a while, I wanted to switch to the PW and I forced a sync with the BlackBerry app. When I picked up the PW, I expected the Kindle to show that I had read further on another device and should it move to that location. But it didn't. It stayed on the starting page and even after I forced the sync, it wouldn't work.

I got my Android out and tried the same thing. But on the Android app, the Sync option is now disabled. I wonder if Amazon have a new method of identifying the ASIN in the eBook files or if I'm missing something. I use calibre to convert all my books to *.mobi and in the output options, I have chosen the format as old and left the personal docs tag empty.

When that didn't work, I also messed around with the *.mobi file using the Mobi2Mobi GUI and set the EXTH113 to ASIN and the EXTH501 to EBOK.

Is anyone else facing a similar issue, or is it a problem on my side? I can confirm that the personal documents still work (which also implies that WhisperSync works) and I can sync the last read position. But while I have no qualms using the personal documents service, Kindle for BlackBerry (OS 7.1) doesn't support personal documents yet and I doubt if it ever will.