X-Ray is your Kindle’s best-kept secret

As soon as a bookworm, at all times a bookworm. For those who’re the identical, then the ache of selecting between rereading an outdated favourite novel, beginning a brand new sequence, or going to the bookstore to stack one other title atop the TBR pile. At one level or one other, you have absolutely picked up a couple of story at a time and tried to do a tandem read, which will get complicated quick when you’re mixing up one fantasy world with one other. Iron may kill fairies in Terrasen, nevertheless it would not do squat in Prythian.

Typically, you go weeks (or months… and even years) with out ending a ebook, and whenever you lastly choose it again up, you are fully misplaced. You flip open to a chapter stuffed with characters you barely keep in mind. Are they brothers, or simply finest pals? Who’s that facet character, and the place did she come from?

Or perhaps you are totally immersed within the sequence, however there are simply so many characters that protecting observe feels unimaginable. Sticky notes between pages will help, however when you’re studying on a Kindle or different e-reader, you may’t precisely wedge Submit-its between digital pages. Fortuitously, there is a good function that handles all of that for you — protecting characters organized and simple to reference: X-Ray.

What’s X-Ray on Kindle e-readers?

Seeing between the traces

X-Ray is a reference software constructed proper into your Kindle. It permits you to faucet on the title of a personality or place and immediately get contextual data on them. It even works with obscurer phrases particular to that ebook.

Typically, relying on the ebook, there’ll even be hyperlinks to Goodreads, Wikipedia, or one other exterior supply that may present extra of an index on whichever time period you select. Nevertheless, some customers point out that some books’ X-Ray function have subsequent to no data whereas others function a complete index in and of itself.

As for the non-hyperlinked sources, you may even entry them with out an web connection, corresponding to on airplane mode or out and about with out Wi-Fi. The knowledge is saved inside the e-book itself, and authors may even go in and add, edit, or just allow X-Ray entries for his or her Kindle e-books by way of Amazon Direct Publishing.

A few of the issues a ebook’s X-Ray will present embody:

• Biographies
• Associated passages
• Further context
• Notes that the writer added themselves

Learn how to entry an e-book’s X-Ray

It is somewhat hidden

Identical to most of Kindle’s settings and options, X-Ray is simple to make use of and comparatively intuitive to seek out. Nevertheless, not like altering the font dimension and margin sizes, X-Ray is in a unique menu. This is the right way to discover it:

1. Begin inside the ebook you are presently studying. Faucet the prime of the web page to tug up the highest menu.
2. Faucet the stop-light menu within the higher right-hand nook.
3. Faucet X-Ray.

Relying in your ebook, sure tabs will seem on the prime. For instance: Notable clips, Individuals, Phrases, and Pictures populated for the prequel to Throne of Glass, known as Murderer’s Blade, by Sarah J Maas. This specific ebook is principally a group of tales in numerous locations, so it appears like there are dozens of characters to maintain observe of always, so I believed it good to make use of it to showcase the X-Ray function.

The Notable clips part consists of precisely that — X-Ray pulls numerous sentences and paragraphs from throughout the ebook which might be vital to the story or fundamental characters themselves. You need to use the tiny arrows on the left and proper sides of the display to toggle by way of them, and above the quote itself, there’s a progress bar that tells you the placement of every of the quotes, in addition to the chapter or part title.

Beneath Individuals, you may first see the point out of characters in your present web page. Then, you may scroll right down to see different characters within the ebook, in addition to every of their mentions. The principle character of Murderer’s Blade, Celaena Sardothien, was talked about 1,081 instances. After I clicked her title, I acquired entry to tabs that confirmed me her particular person notable clips, in addition to all mentions of her title on the whole. For a fundamental character, this is probably not as useful. Nevertheless, for a personality talked about solely a couple of times at first who makes a shock look on the finish, this function is extremely helpful.

Phrases is extra hit-or-miss, however for sequence that function totally different sorts of individuals and/or magic techniques, just like the Grishaverse books by Leigh Bardugo, it is additional useful. Lastly, Pictures is one other part that may both be useful or not — some books solely have a picture for the duvet of the ebook itself. Nevertheless, in case your ebook incorporates a map at first or finish, X-Ray is an effective way to rapidly reference it when you’re making an attempt to get a lay of the land — it undoubtedly helped me once I tried to know the logistics of Sam and Frodo’s journey to Mordor.