# How can I see which SERIES a book belongs to on my Kindle?



## guiri (Feb 9, 2012)

I just tried the Caliber software (very cool by the way) and there was an option
to list which series a book belongs to.
In this case the Wilbur Smith books but, when I look at them
in the book list on the kindle, I can't see the series.

Is there a way to do this?

Thanks

George


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## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

You have to change the book title to include the series information.

Mike


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## guiri (Feb 9, 2012)

Thanks


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## StephenR (Mar 5, 2012)

Actually jmiked is incorrect. You _don't_ have to change the book title - though, of course, you can do it that way if you want. 

Provided the series information has been entered in Calibre, you can very easily set things up so that the series and series number appear automatically on your Kindle. Have a look here: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=118563 - the very first entry shows you how to add series info on the Kindle.


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## SusanCassidy (Nov 9, 2008)

That is the same as changing the title - you are just setting Calibre up to do it for you.  There is no other way to get the series to display separately on the Kindle.


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## StephenR (Mar 5, 2012)

SusanCassidy said:


> That is the same as changing the title - you are just setting Calibre up to do it for you. There is no other way to get the series to display separately on the Kindle.


No, it's not the same at all. Using this method, the title of the book within Calibre and on your PC remains unchanged. You're setting Calibre to change the metadata that is included inside the file when it is transferred to the Kindle. The title that is displayed on the Kindle screen is read from the metadata within the file and does not necessarily even match the actual name of the file that is stored on the Kindle. The joy of this is that it takes just seconds to set up and puts an end to all that long-winded manual renaming within Calibre.


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## SusanCassidy (Nov 9, 2008)

I was talking about the book title in the metadata.  The filename doesn't matter at all - has nothing to do with how the name is displayed on the Kindle.


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## StephenR (Mar 5, 2012)

SusanCassidy said:


> I was talking about the book title in the metadata.


Ah. We were obviously talking at slightly cross-purposes, since I was referring to the book's title within Calibre. My apologies for not being more clear as to my meaning. The OP asked how he could get the series info from Calibre to display on the Kindle and was told that to do so he would need to put the series info in the title. The implication being that he would need to edit the entry in the 'title' column in Calibre to include the required info, which, of course, would do the job perfectly. Having been in the OPs position myself, I was merely trying to point out an extremely powerful alternative that didn't require any work or editing of the title (Calibre 'title') to implement.


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## guiri (Feb 9, 2012)

Well, in my case I'm too stupid to figure any of this out


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## Morf (Nov 18, 2010)

OK, let me try and simplify.

If you have the Title, Series and Series Index correct in Calibre, you can then set Calibre to change the title of the book to include these when it sends the book to your Kindle.

Taking one example from the page StephenR links to - it's the second one, credited to Scott Nielson:

Suppose you have the books:

George RR Martin A Game of Thrones A Song of Fire and Ice [1]
George RR Martin A Clash of Kings A Song of Fire and Ice [2]

...and you want the titles to appear on your Kindle as:

A Song of Fire and Ice [01] - A Game of Thrones
A Song of Fire and Ice [02] - A Clash of Kings

What you do is go into Calibre, pick Preferences, Metaboard Plugboards.

On the row that says "Add new Plugboard", select format of "Mobi", device of "Kindle", then in the source template field paste this line:


```
{series:|| }{series_index:0>2s|[|] - }{title}
```
and set the destination field to title. Then hit "save plugboard" and Apply.

When you send the book to your Kindle, the title should be changed as shown above.

If it doesn't work, pick the plugboard, and double check the settings. If you don't want it any more, pick it and click "delete plugboard".

HTH!


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## guiri (Feb 9, 2012)

This seems like something I MIGHT be able to figure out. I'll give it a shot and I'll report back, thanks


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## valleycat1 (Mar 15, 2011)

I just place books in a series in a collection on my kindle named after the series as I buy them. I'm too lazy to go through a lot of effort using calibre or whatever, which would be great as I could designate where the book falls in the series.


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## guiri (Feb 9, 2012)

All this is a bit hypothetical for me anyway as it's not that important, however, that's how I learn things and it's cool to know.
Needless to say, I can easily just look up the book and see which order it is in a series but not as cool


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## kapierce65 (Dec 31, 2011)

Morf said:


> OK, let me try and simplify.
> 
> If you have the Title, Series and Series Index correct in Calibre, you can then set Calibre to change the title of the book to include these when it sends the book to your Kindle.
> 
> ...


Has this changed for the Kindle Fire HD? It worked perfectly on my original kindle and now the series will not show after I put them on the HD.


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## Morf (Nov 18, 2010)

Have you changed from a Kindle Fire to a Kindle Fire HD, or from a Kindle to a Fire HD?

The Kindle and Kindle Fire are regarded as different devices by Calibre, so when you change you would need to change your device to the Fire (rerunning the welcome wizard is the easiest way), and change the settings in the plugboard from KINDLE to KINDLE_FIRE.

If your original device was a fire, and you had Calibre set up for a fire, then you shouldn't need to change anything at all.

If you don't get any other advice on here, I think what you might have to do is to ask a question over on the mobileread Calibre discussion thread (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=166). This is where the most knowledgeable Calibre users hang out, including Kovid Goyal (the developer).

If you summarise how you have Calibre set up right now, and what (if any) changes you made when you switched to the Fire HD, I'm sure you'll get some help.


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## kapierce65 (Dec 31, 2011)

Thank You, Thank You! Everybody here is AWESOME!!!


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