# Pruning of "Manage My Kindle" is tedious.



## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Ugh. I been putting this off and off. I have to go back to 2008, when I started getting kindle books and cull out stuff I will  never read and is mostly freebie stuff. Pain in the you know what. I do a backup in calibre at the same time and try to do the shelving on goodreads one at a time. Plan is to do it by month and then check them off as all the data has been entered. 
But to see the old stuff in the account, I have to sort by date backwards and every single time I delete a book, it not only has to rebuild the archive, it has to start at the current date again, so I have to find my place again. 

I am about to pull my hair out. I can't believe they don't have a better way after all these years to organize the archive. 

ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR 

I am not missing an easier way, am I?


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## SusanCassidy (Nov 9, 2008)

No.  You can open new tabs with the same page in it, though, if that helps keep your place.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Atunah said:


> I am not missing an easier way, am I?


Yes...leave your archive in MYK alone.


Betsy


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Yes...leave your archive in MYK alone.
> 
> 
> Betsy


But I need to do spring cleaning on it, well summer cleaning now. I have things in there that just have to go. 

If I am not capable of de-cluttering my desk and various other areas in the house, by golly at least my book archive will be.


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## Cardinal (Feb 24, 2010)

Call, write, e-mail, skywrite Amazon and give them your feedback.  I think almost all Kindle users will eventually run into this.


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## history_lover (Aug 9, 2010)

I'm the same way - if there's a freebie I've realized I'm never going to read, I don't like it sitting in my account, I have to either read it or purge it. 

If you know the names of the titles you want to delete, just type it into the search bar and go straight to it. I find what I want to delete from my to-read list on Goodread (or at kindle.amazon.com) and then use the search bar in Manage Your Kindle to find it.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

I do think you pretty much have to go through page by page. You can re-order the page however. If you click 'title' it reorders by title. Click again, and it's reverse order. Also works for 'author' and 'date'.

Unfortunately, it doesn't _stay_ sorted when you then delete something. 

It's a little easier if you use tabs and open MYK - books in one tab and the kindle.amazon.com site in another. On k.a.c you can sort by title or author, but not by purchase date. You can also, however, sort it by the rating you've given it and whether you've marked it read, reading, not finished, etc. So use the k.a.c page to find books you want rid of and then go to MYK to delete it.

Problem is, you don't also delete it from k.a.c when you do that. So if you want a book gone from both places, you have to delete it separately from both places. The good news is that on k.a.c you just click something do remove it from that list and when you switch pages it will be removed. . . .but you can do it in bulk. On MYK you have to do it one at a time. 

I expect you could do a similar thing if you also keep your books well organized via GoodReads or Shelfari.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Atunah said:


> But I need to do spring cleaning on it, well summer cleaning now. I have things in there that just have to go.
> 
> If I am not capable of de-cluttering my desk and various other areas in the house, by golly at least my book archive will be.


I've deleted a few things from my archive, but mostly I leave it alone. But I understand the need. Just teasin' ya! 

I need to do the same thing with my Fire apps...I have some I've downloaded trying to find KBAADs. Need to purge, and it really isn't any easier...

There should be a checkbox so you can do multiple deletes. Definitely contact Amazon about it.

Betsy


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Yeah, I've send them a feedback. I am pretty sure I did that before.  . Can't hurt. Maybe one day they do something with that page. 

I think I'll try opening another tab with the same page from MMK. Typing in the name won't work for me as I don't remember the names of them. I am trying to basically sync up my goodreads account, my calibre backup and whats in MMK. So the best way to do that is backwards by month, so I know where I am at. I have done up to February 2009. Next up, March 2009. Only a bit more to go, right?   

Oh dear, the apps. Why did you have to remind my of the apps.  .


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

I'd start with your goodreads stuff in one tab and MYK in another. If you make them both alphabetical by title, you should be able to find stuff that is in one but not the other and figure out what to do that way.

Or work similarly with your Calibre back up.

With two tabs of MYK, the problem I've had is that the one tab won't update as I delete from the other. . . . . .but maybe that would make it easier.

I should probably work on this sort of project myself. . . .I get to start with July *2008*!


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

You have a more more month than I do. I started in November of 2008  

I already do the tabs of goodreads and MMK and also calibre. Book by book. Its just the best way to do it by month. I never added all the freebies to my goodreads account, nor to my calibre. Its very spotty. By month I can check off when I am done with one and move to the next. That way I can do it over time and take breaks etc. And its also the only way to be sure I get to every single book and have proper goodreads shelfs. 

Doing a second tab with MMK might work, even if the first one won't update. I can update it once a page then rater than every time. 

Later I'll do another month or two. Sigh.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

The thing about MYK updating, is that when it does, the sorting you'd set disappears. And you have to reset the sort and remember where you left off. . .that would actually be easier to do if you have an MYK page that HASN'T updated. . . . .hmm. . . . .have to think about it. 

My difficulty is that, while there are a bunch of books *I* don't care about, my brother shares my account so I'm hesitant to just delete a book that he might want to read. Or read again. So I have to be pretty careful about what I decide is o.k. to dump. And ask him if I'm in doubt.

I did, maybe 2 years ago, delete a bunch of the freebies I'd picked up early on that I realized were useless. I've gotten much more discriminating since.


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## Chad Winters (Oct 28, 2008)

I'd just like an easy way to identify books I've bought and forgot about. Ive been at it since 2008 as well and there are a lot of books in MMK!


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Ann in Arlington said:


> I did, maybe 2 years ago, delete a bunch of the freebies I'd picked up early on that I realized were useless. I've gotten much more discriminating since.


I did too. In recent times, I only get stuff I really might read and I vet it just like bought books. But back in the day, I was all like, ohhhh free books. Gimme gimme . I also have a lot of those preview "books" that were all over the place for a while. Where they gave you like a few chapters. I didn't pay enough attention then. I also have a lot of christian fiction stuff for some reason. That was before I learned about looking for publishers. I just looked at the cover and clicked. I will not ever read those. Then there are books that I don't even know anymore what I was thinking, or why they are even in the account. I must have done freebie book one click sleep walking or something.

I am the only one that uses the account, so its all mine. Hubby very rarely reads and if it does, its some old science fiction stuff like Heinlein. He is more a magazine reader.

I just want this done so I can then from forward on be updated and have proper backup and goodreads data.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

I am with Betsy on this one.  Besides if I leave them at MYK, I know I have gotten them once and won't get them again accidently.  But then I really don't want to have to sort through over 2000 cook and craft books at MYK.  Just to get to the few I might delete.
And oh wow on July 20th all the digital stuff I had bought ended in 9 for each year.
2011 69
2012 1929
2013 3479
So nope not messing with MYK.


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## Chad Winters (Oct 28, 2008)

Now that Amazon owns Goodreads, I wish there was a way to import my ebooks there for easy categorizing


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

So having another tab with MMK is working much better. The one I am looking at stays the same until I refresh and I just type in the book I want to delete in the other tab and then in the time it refreshes, I move on to the next book to check data and such. One by one. I am through 2009 July.  . 
I had notice that in March 2009 I only got one book. I must have been in a coma or something.  

Still about 2000 books to go through one by one.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

Atunah said:


> So having another tab with MMK is working much better. The one I am looking at stays the same until I refresh and I just type in the book I want to delete in the other tab and then in the time it refreshes, I move on to the next book to check data and such. One by one. I am through 2009 July. .
> *I had notice that in March 2009 I only got one book. I must have been in a coma or something. *
> 
> Still about 2000 books to go through one by one.


Was that when you'd just received your new K2 so were spending all your time adding existing books to IT!


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Ann in Arlington said:


> Was that when you'd just received your new K2 so were spending all your time adding existing books to IT!


I never did get the K2. I went straight from K1 to K3. 
I think that might have been the time when I had some annoying health issues, so I was busy with other things.

Or I was reading a lot and whining about not getting the K2.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Chad Winters said:


> Now that Amazon owns Goodreads, I wish there was a way to import my ebooks there for easy categorizing


Since one can import from Amazon to Shelfari, one would hope they'll make that available to Goodreads, too. Another thing to ping CS about!

Betsy


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

okay, i gotta admit that the thought of going into MYK and deleting books I'm not going to read/read again has never occurred to me. i guess that since it doesn't take up space on my kindle, i don't worry about it.  i guess i just don't use MYK that much, i tend to download from my device.  and with the current reading project, i'm only downloading one letter set of books at a time.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

telracs said:


> okay, i gotta admit that the thought of going into MYK and deleting books I'm not going to read/read again has never occurred to me. i guess that since it doesn't take up space on my kindle, i don't worry about it. i guess i just don't use MYK that much, i tend to download from my device. and with the current reading project, i'm only downloading one letter set of books at a time.


I think the issue for some people is, that with the inability to tag MYK entries or sort into collections, if you have a very large collection in MYK, it's tedious to search through the books to pick one to read. Culling the herd occassionally reduces the problem. Somewhat.

I tend to sort it different ways in order to look at them, but can understand the desire to shrink the numbers. Though I'm too lazy to do it. 

Betsy


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## JetJammer (Jan 18, 2009)

I'm definitely impressed.  I have thousands of books on my Kindle, and I break out in hives just thinking about trying to go through them and figure out what to keep and what to delete.  Like most, I bought every "free" book when they first started putting them out.  I've probably read 1% of the books I picked up, but you never know, maybe someday in a dry spell...

I did finally get smart and start sending any books I picked up for free that I wasn't positive I'd read to my Kindle for PC instead of my actual Kindle.  From there I throw them into a "freebies" folder, and occasionally go through it looking for something to read.  So while they're still on my MYK, I don't have to wade through them all the time on my actual reader.


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## kwajkat (Nov 6, 2008)

This has been a pet peeve of mine as well. I periodically email kindle support asking why they can't fix the MYK area to make it more user friendly. I have given up trying to go through and cull my library after it took 4 hours to delete 10 books.  Have even told them to hire a programmer who knows how to fix this problem area. I also have been really getting annoyed because a lot of my books are not showing up on any of my devices in the cloud and sometimes they don't show up when I type in the name either. Finally when they update a book the old ones keeps hanging around so I have duplicates and no way to determine which is the corrected copy and which one to delete.  And another thing... I need some cheese to go with my whine right now!!


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## history_lover (Aug 9, 2010)

Atunah said:


> Yeah, I've send them a feedback. I am pretty sure I did that before. . Can't hurt. Maybe one day they do something with that page.
> 
> I think I'll try opening another tab with the same page from MMK. Typing in the name won't work for me as I don't remember the names of them. I am trying to basically sync up my goodreads account, my calibre backup and whats in MMK. So the best way to do that is backwards by month, so I know where I am at. I have done up to February 2009. Next up, March 2009. Only a bit more to go, right?
> 
> Oh dear, the apps. Why did you have to remind my of the apps. .


I assume you must not add each book to your GR shelves when you buy them? I usually do this so I don't need to manually sync them later. But alternatively, going to kindle.amazon.com should list all the books you've bought - it's like MYK but with more organization. In the rare times my GR has been missing some books, I use kindle.amazon.com to figure out which ones. I don't really understand why you need to do it chronologically but whatever works for you.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

I think Atunah has a ton of old purchases to cull.  I think recent purchases are good, from what I've read in the thread.  Doing it chronologically means she doesn't have to gonthrough new stuff.

Betsy


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I think Atunah has a ton of old purchases to cull. I think recent purchases are good, from what I've read in the thread. Doing it chronologically means she doesn't have to gonthrough new stuff.
> 
> Betsy


Yep, that's about it. I just never kept up with putting everything into goodreads and making proper backup. I also mostly ignored the free stuff. I been pretty current for the last few months to a year I think. Its the old stuff I kept putting off. And since I can't purchase anything back in time, doing it by month starting from the beginning, makes sure I don't miss anything. Then I'll never have to go back to those months and years again and just make sure I keep it current from this day forward.

I haven't been as crazy with downloading freebies, so pretty much everything I get now, free or paid, is something I will keep and read at some point.

I just needed a system and doing it month by month works for this. Then I can take a break and pick up right where I left off. I am marking the months off on a piece of paper as I go. I do 3 things at a time with each book. Look it up in goodreads and either add or fix data/shelves, calibre, or decide on getting rid of it.

This way I can do it whenever I find some time. I am almost done with 2010. 
This is really the first time I am going through this mess so there is just a lot of older stuff that needs to go or needs to be cataloged.

So in the future, when I browse the archives on my kindles, or browse through the carousel, I can actually just pick something and it will be something I probably want to read. It will have only the picked out stuff in it.

I tend to get obsessive with lists and spreadsheets and charts. The numbers have to match. I want it clean and organized. . And I have a bit of time for a couple of weeks.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

JetJammer said:


> I'm definitely impressed. I have thousands of books on my Kindle, and I break out in hives just thinking about trying to go through them and figure out what to keep and what to delete. Like most, I bought every "free" book when they first started putting them out. I've probably read 1% of the books I picked up, but you never know, maybe someday in a dry spell...
> 
> I did finally get smart and start sending any books I picked up for free that I wasn't positive I'd read to my Kindle for PC instead of my actual Kindle. From there I throw them into a "freebies" folder, and occasionally go through it looking for something to read. So while they're still on my MYK, I don't have to wade through them all the time on my actual reader.


You know the really cool thing about K4PC, you can send the books there, put them in a folder, then remove them from the device. The covers stay in the folder but they don't take up any room on your computer.


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## stevene9 (Nov 9, 2008)

That's why I don't buy freebies unless I plan on reading them. Unless it a special introductory offer from an author, you can always download the free stuff. Of the 1100+ books on my MYK pages, other than the recent purchases, there are only maybe 5 to10 unread books.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

stevene9 said:


> That's why I don't buy freebies unless I plan on reading them. Unless it a special introductory offer from an author, you can always download the free stuff. Of the 1100+ books on my MYK pages, other than the recent purchases, there are only maybe 5 to10 unread books.


I plan on reading all of mine. I just have to live another 50-60 years. 

Seriously, though, only 5-10 unread books in my archive wouldn't work for me. I want to have a library with me wherever I go, regardless of whether I have connectivity or not. It's why I got the Kindle. So, most of the books I buy go to Harper the PW. Some that I'm not sure of go to a different device. But whichever Kindle I pick up has a ton of books I haven't read. My personal library. Love it!

Betsy


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

Yeah. . . I'm with Betsy. . . I've got thousands of books. . . . . and I like that.

Here's what I think happens. When we used to buy paper, we had to budget. (At least, I did.  ) We couldn't just buy everything we wanted as soon as we saw it (even paperbacks were at least $6 to $8 for new books) and we figured out how to stretch the book dollars by buying used. We knew we couldn't just carry everything with us all all the time, and books all cost actual money, so were a lot more careful to be sure we were buying something that, if we started reading it, we'd be pretty sure it would be something we'd want to continue. Worst thing in the world: on vacation, ran out of books, except for one I started that was just horrible. Necessitated an emergency trip to a bookstore -- which the Hubs totally didn't get!  

So, speaking just for me, I rarely bought more than 5 or 6 at a time. Mind you, I'd usually purchase every couple of weeks, so, in my house, I almost always had at least a half dozen books I'd not read. Unless I knew I'd be travelling, in which case I'd stockpile. And I always carried way more books than I thought I'd really read because, after all, you don't know what you'll want to read next, right? 

When I got the kindle, I had the same mindset for a while -- buy a few at at a time -- have plenty to read. With paper it was a case of not being sure when you'd get out again to shop -- though Amazon even then made that a bit easier. But the real thing was FREE BOOKS!  O.M.G. I can get books for FREE! Wow! Just WOW! <total happy dance> AND. . . . . I could carry them ALL with me ALL the time! How cool!

So, you're thinking, with all these free books, I'll never ever not have something to read. So for the first 6 months of kindle ownership, there is a tendency to tell oneself, "no, that's not my usual genre, but I don't mind branching out, and I'd rather have _something_ to read than nothing. And it's not like it takes up extra space or weight!" But at some point you realize -- hey, even the books I'm sure I want aren't costing any more than they ever did, and they're often much cheaper. So my book buying budget goes farther anyway. And, really, I don't _want_ to read these freebies if I've something available I've chosen for a much better reason.

And that's when you start being a bit more careful about what free books you click on. Plus. . . if you joined kBoards, you also learned about other tools for finding books at good prices that are actually something you will PLAN to read -- rather than something you feel like you get just because you can.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Ann in Arlington said:


> So, speaking just for me, I rarely bought more than 5 or 6 at a time. Mind you, I'd usually purchase every couple of weeks, so, in my house, I almost always had at least a half dozen books I'd not read. Unless I knew I'd be traveling, in which case I'd stockpile. And I always carried way more books than I thought I'd really read because, after all, you don't know what you'll want to read next, right?


^Exactly. And still, I can't tell you how many times I've bought books ON trips because I still ran out. That will never happen again! *does happy dance.*

Plus I'd have to leave books behind to make room for other books or souveniers. No more of that, either! Love my Kindle.

Betsy


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> ^Exactly. And still, I can't tell you how many times I've bought books ON trips because I still ran out. That will never happen again! *does happy dance.*
> 
> Plus I'd have to leave books behind to make room for other books or souveniers. No more of that, either! Love my Kindle.
> 
> Betsy


Yeah. . . . . which meant you had to be careful what you brought and try to figure out, ahead of time, if it was a book that you'd be _willing_ to leave behind! 

Interestingly, though, on my recent trip to Cincinnati, even though I had a whole kindle full of books. . . I did buy another one -- something recommended by one of the folks there. She was talking about a priest she'd met who had all sorts of stories about the Second Vatican Council. Which was, after all, 50 years ago. He had talked about how they'd have meetings and then someone would type up the handwritten notes on mimeograph paper and they'd run off purple copies which the more junior priests and seminarians would then hand carry to all the priests and bishops so they'd have it to read for the next day's meetings.

And she mentioned the book by this guy and I had it on my kindle in less than a minute.  It's a different world!


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Yes you can always get free books but you cannot always get free books from authors you like.  If Konrath/Kilborn puts one of his books free you can bet I will be getting it.  It is only free for 3 days at a promo.
So yes the perma-free books are always there.  The promo freebies aren't.  And like Betsy I plan on reading everything.
I love my kindle for vacations.  Tons of books and no space taken up.


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Culling culling and more culling. Weeeeeee    

I have year 2012 to do and half of 2011. The other years are done. I have deleted 100's of books. 500 or so. 
Some of the stuff, holy moly.  . I have no idea why I had so much christian fiction there, must have not looked close enough. I was also surprised how much stuff turned out to be just a few pages. I am guessing that was info not clearly marked at the time I got them. I don't read short stories. No clue why there was so many. 

Another thing I found out was, there were many series that I got the first long time ago, but looking at the books now, the series were never continued. Just dropped. Like the author just fell of the face of the earth. Got rid of those fast. That is why I don't like getting series stuff by new authors.  Especially series that are more connected. 

Been off today, so tried to get a lot in. Its way to hot outside to do anything. 

Now if I could just de-clutter my house like this. Although I did one of those early this year when we had mice in the apartment building. I highly recommend getting a rodent infestation to force yourself to declutter.     . They ate everything.   

Back to July 2011


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## Lil Black Dress Press (Aug 12, 2012)

Good for you Atunah.

I also like to be super organized and cull books. Then I can find what I want easier.


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## Shastastan (Oct 28, 2009)

I have not been on here for a long time - to my detriment.  Thanks to you nice folks and your posts, I've just learned about goodreads.  My issue is with the books that I've already read.  As soon as I finish a book I remove it from the device.  My wife and I share the same archive.  We actually like many of the same books.  We both have CRS though so we need a separate system for each of us to keep track of books we've read.  Sounds like separate goodreads may be a possibility?


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Either separate, or you can just create a shelf for you and a shelf for wife for "read". You can even make it exclusive, meaning like the set shelf that goodreads gives you, you can make your own. So instead of using goodreads "read" shelf, name one read-shastastan and read-mrs-shastastan and make them exclusive.  

Then you wouldn't need 2 different goodreads accounts, since you share a lot of the tastes.

I don't know what CRS is though.


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## Toby (Nov 25, 2008)

I just bought all of Ray Bradbury (16) Books yesterday that was yesterday's Kindle Daily Deal, because I never read them & most likely never would if not for the deal. Yes, I do plan on reading them, because I want to know why he was so popular. Yes, I know, it's crazy. I was in a wild & crazy mood. My problem is that all those books are not showing up on my MMK page, but they do show up on my Open Orders Page.     I want my books to show up on my MMK page!


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

There are some issues today with the My Kindle page. I can't even load all my books and I got a couple of library books that aren't showing up either. Hopefully they'll have it fixed soon.


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## Toby (Nov 25, 2008)

Thanks for mentioning this. I am sorry that you had trouble as well.


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## cinisajoy (Mar 10, 2013)

Atunah said:


> Either separate, or you can just create a shelf for you and a shelf for wife for "read". You can even make it exclusive, meaning like the set shelf that goodreads gives you, you can make your own. So instead of using goodreads "read" shelf, name one read-shastastan and read-mrs-shastastan and make them exclusive.
> 
> Then you wouldn't need 2 different goodreads accounts, since you share a lot of the tastes.
> 
> I don't know what CRS is though.


CRS is Can't remember sh*t.


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

cinisajoy said:


> CRS is Can't remember sh*t.


Ah yes, suffer from that too.

What was that? 

So I got all my months and years done in my account. I was ready to bring out my dancing bananas. Then I found I had "stashed" 350 books in the trash on the YourMediaLibrary. And of course, you can't delete from there. I have to add them back to my "collection" to make them appear in my account and then delete them one by one. Each time I have to wait for it to re-built again and again. ARGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG    

*wimpers


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