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

As soon as a bookworm, at all times a bookworm. In the event you’re the identical, then the ache of selecting between rereading an previous 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 certainly 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 would possibly kill fairies in Terrasen, nevertheless it does not do squat in Prythian.

Typically, you go weeks (or months… and even years) with out ending a e-book, and whenever you lastly choose it again up, you are utterly misplaced. You flip open to a chapter stuffed with characters you barely bear in mind. Are they brothers, or simply finest mates? 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 preserving observe feels not possible. Sticky notes between pages can assist, however when you’re studying on a Kindle or different e-reader, you’ll be able to’t precisely wedge Publish-its between digital pages. Thankfully, there is a sensible characteristic that handles all of that for you — preserving characters organized and straightforward to reference: X-Ray.

What’s X-Ray on Kindle e-readers?

Seeing between the strains

X-Ray is a reference instrument constructed proper into your Kindle. It helps you to faucet on the identify of a personality or place and immediately get contextual info on them. It even works with obscurer phrases particular to that e-book.

Typically, relying on the e-book, 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 characteristic have subsequent to no info whereas others function a complete index in and of itself.

As for the non-hyperlinked sources, you’ll be able to even entry them with out an web connection, corresponding to on airplane mode or out and about with out Wi-Fi. The data is saved throughout 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 via Amazon Direct Publishing.

A number of the issues a e-book’s X-Ray will present embrace:

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

Easy methods 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 search out. Nevertheless, in contrast to altering the font dimension and margin sizes, X-Ray is in a distinct menu. Here is how you can discover it:

1. Begin throughout the e-book you are at the moment studying. Faucet the prime of the web page to drag up the highest menu.
2. Faucet the stop-light menu within the higher right-hand nook.
3. Faucet X-Ray.

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

The Notable clips part contains precisely that — X-Ray pulls varied sentences and paragraphs from throughout the e-book which can be necessary to the story or principal characters themselves. You need to use the tiny arrows on the left and proper sides of the display screen to toggle via 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 identify.

Underneath Individuals, you may first see the point out of characters in your present web page. Then, you’ll be able to scroll right down to see different characters within the e-book, in addition to every of their mentions. The principle character of Murderer’s Blade, Celaena Sardothien, was talked about 1,081 occasions. After I clicked her identify, I bought entry to tabs that confirmed me her particular person notable clips, in addition to all mentions of her identify normally. For a principal character, this will not be as useful. Nevertheless, for a personality talked about solely a couple of times initially who makes a shock look on the finish, this characteristic is extremely helpful.

Phrases is extra hit-or-miss, however for sequence that characteristic totally different varieties of individuals and/or magic methods, just like the Grishaverse books by Leigh Bardugo, it is further helpful. Lastly, Photographs is one other part that can both be useful or not — some books solely have a picture for the quilt of the e-book itself. Nevertheless, in case your e-book includes a map initially or finish, X-Ray is an effective way to rapidly reference it when you’re attempting to get a lay of the land — it positively helped me after I tried to know the logistics of Sam and Frodo’s journey to Mordor.