How to Send Documents to your Kindle

In yesterday’s post, I listed 10 tips for self-editing, and tip #3 was to send your novel to your Kindle so that you can read through it, and also make notes and highlight what needs changing.

This post will detail exactly how to send your novel (or any other document you want) to your Kindle device (or to your iPad/iPhone or Android phone).

Step #1: Find your Kindle device email address

In order to email the document to your device, you will need to find out the email address. You can do this by signing into Amazon, then on the ‘Your Account’ drop down menu, select ‘Manage Your Content and Devices‘. Then click on the furthest right tab ‘Settings‘, then scroll down the page to ‘Personal Document Settings‘.  You will see ‘Send to Kindle Email Settings’ which will have underneath a list of devices and a list of email addresses that will end in ‘@kindle.com‘. These are your kindle addresses. Choose the address for the device you wish to send the document to, and in order to avoid any delivery fees, change the end of the address to – ‘@free.kindle.com‘.

Step #2: Add your normal email address to the safe list

Under ‘Personal Document Settings‘, you will see ‘Approved Personal Document Email List’. To add your normal email address to the approved list, click on ‘Add a new improved email address’ then enter the details.

Step #3: Send the document via email

Go to your normal email account, open a new email, enter your Kindle address in the recipient box, put the title of your book in the subject heading, then attach the book file to the email, and send. It may take a while to get to your Kindle, as they format it for you.

Step #4: Sync and download document to your Kindle

If your Kindle wifi is on, then it should sync new items and download straight away, but if not, switch the wifi on, and click on download new items. Your document should then show up just like any other book that you have purchased from Amazon.

Step #5: Make notes and highlights

On Kindles and on Kindle Readers, you usually have the option to highlight, bookmark and create notes. It’s then usually possible to just scroll through those notes and highlights easily when you’ve finished. I usually highlight all the things that need changing, and then I go through them one by one, inputting the changes into the file on my computer.

Step #6: Sending documents to others

Another reason why knowing how to do this is so useful to authors, is that when you are at the stage of getting beta readers (and family and friends) to read your book so they can give you feedback, instead of printing out the book, or sending them a PDF or word document, you can simply get them to add your normal email address to their safe list, get them to find their kindle address and give it to you, and then you can send the document directly to their device. Then they have your book on their Kindle, so they can read it easily and give you feedback. I have done this many times, and it is a much simpler way to do it.

These instructions are based on Amazon.co.uk, I assume that it will be a similar process on Amazon.com etc.

Michelle is the author and publisher of 8 Visionary Fiction novels, all available on Amazon in paperback and on Kindle. She spends her days helping Indie Authors to publish their books, taking photographs and making gluten-free cakes.

If you need any help with your publishing journey, please do get in touch with her by emailing theamethystangel@hotmail.co.uk. You can book a Skype session or a phone call with her, or ask questions via email. Please do follow this blog to receive more posts on Indie Publishing.

Disclaimer: All views, ideas and tips presented on this website are my own, based on my own experience and the experience of my clients. It is by no means the only way to do it, or the right way to do it, but it is the way that works for me. Please take what helps you and makes sense to you, and don’t worry about the rest for now. Please know that I take no responsibility for anything that happens as a result of you following my advice. I have created this blog as a resource for Indie Authors to help them make the publishing journey a little easier.