To be annoyed when Kindle edits my books

[AlertCat]

I like to read books I enjoy over and over. I get to know the phrases and reading them is comforting and soothing. I recently re-read an old favourite (published in the 90s) on my kindle, and a lot of the more colourful phrases and terms have been removed. Sometimes for no good reason, eg they’re not offensive in any world; and sometimes their removal took something away from what was left.

I wish I had a paper copy of this book to read ☹️
the changes feel jarring and I can’t see the point- but more importantly, I bought the original, and Amazon have altered what I bought without notice.

I’m sure I could- it’s Rachel’s Holiday by Marian Keyes, and I worry I’ll need to buy all the early ones again! However, I know a place with a few charity bookshops so I’ll cross my fingers!

My main beef with Kindle is that many of the titles I’ve bought have clearly been scanned in from physical copies with no or minimal checking. Ps that become Fs are common. The Talented Mr Ripley was filled with confusing and distracting errors, which I thought was inexcusable for a book that is hardly obscure.

At least it’s unlikely they’d bothered enough with it to start chopping and changing the content - I’d rather errors than deliberate unsolicited and unwanted editing choices.

They do it often, they can also delete any or everything you have paid for. In the small print it pretty much says you’re only paying to borrow the book they license, you never own it.

Oh I wasn't expecting it to be that @AlertCat I thought it would be something much older!

That’s the one I was talking about!!

It’s not just ebooks this happens to. DH’s favourite book is The Exploits of Moominpapa. He bought new copy and loads of it was changed from the original. It had lost all its charm.

Don't mess with the Moomins!

Seriously though, I would have thought that would be timeless.

Also hate when it shows you how many people highlighted a section as it means that’s obviously profound or relevant or intrinsic to the story and it’s kind of a spoiler, and if you don’t find it just as interesting it just makes you wonder what all the others saw in it.

it’s a distraction anyway

You can turn that off in the settings.

I know! We wondered if it was a different translation, but no.

Second hand is a good shout, I shall have a look.

Noooo! The Moomin books are perfection as they are, they should never be messed with!

Those are all horrible cuts and changes to make though. Why put characters in more modern dress? Its jarring. And cutting out references to the Great War because they seem dated is terrible. I would strongly judge any editor that did that.

Which one had the character with the child?

@AlertCat Mammy Walsh’s A-Z of the Walsh Family

FrostFlowers2025

I have an ebook reader, but it's not a Kindle. I also load all the ebooks on it in epub format (most of them came from the Gutenberg Project), but I hardly ever connecte my reader to the internet and if I do, I always make sure to have a backup of my files somewhere, in case something happens.
I selected my reader for this very specific purpose, because if you travel Amazon also removes books from your device. It's really annoying, but it's one of the reasons I avoided Kindle.
It’s not kindle doing it though - it’s the author or publisher. If they have it on a number of platforms they’ll change it everywhere

This is awful. I don't have a kindle or e-reader but have toyed with the idea of getting one. This is the nail in the coffin.

I'm also now concerned that many of the physical books I have might not be true to the original story - I've only really been able to buy books regularly in the past 10 -12 years and I read lots of Classics.

They should note in the book (digital or physical) if passages have been removed or altered.

This is upsetting. I've loved The Moomins since I was wee and had intended on collecting the books.

Our only bookshop is Waterstones for new books. We have no second hand bookshops and the charity shops aren't brilliant.

Ah, I haven’t read that yet.

I have contacted World of Books to see if it’s possible to request early editions of things! Fingers crossed.

Could you not collect them o line? Lots of good second hand bookshops to be found that aren’t Amazon and o find the owners are usually lively and would help you track down the right editions.

When Love is Gone, the scene when Scrooge gets broken up with. (Although reading the comments on YouTube it seems it’s back in the Disney+ fully restored version??)
m.youtube.com/watch?v=nGyX7oT89YY

56Chandeliers · Yesterday 17:56

My main beef with Kindle is that many of the titles I’ve bought have clearly been scanned in from physical copies with no or minimal checking. Ps that become Fs are common.

Really? That shouldn't happen at all, they are not supposed to be scanned, but word processed and transformed into Kindle format. I've had a few from friends, which have been converted with Calibre and the difference is obvious - like you describe.

Yes I definitely could, and if anyone knows of some good ones I'd love to hear them as I never buy books online normally.

I had to laugh at the pp who kept a VCR just to watch the original version of the Muppets Christmas Carol—I did the same thing. "When Love Is Gone" is the emotional core of the film, and the scene just doesn't work without it. Scrooge is suddenly crying for no reason, there's no catharsis.

I read somewhere that the song was only ever in the British release of the film though, and thankfully Disney+ now has that full version to stream, so I've finally got rid of the old video.

Yanbu. I would expect the text not to change once I had downloaded it. I thought it stayed the same, living inside my Kindle. I have recently stopped buying Kindle books. It was really handy for reading in the dark as a breastfeeding mum but handing so much cash over to Amazon was making me feel very uncomfortable. I'm going back to the library to save my money and my conscience.