One Book Club, Every Format: Paper, Kindle, Ebook and Audiobook Together

Ask a book club how they read and you will hear every answer: a battered paperback, a Kindle, a phone app on the train, an audiobook while running. Good. Format should never decide who gets to join.

Here is how to keep a mixed-format club on the same page, literally and figuratively.

The problem with mixed formats

• Page numbers do not match between editions, let alone between paper and Kindle.
• Audiobook listeners cannot easily say which page they are on.
• Highlights are trapped in each person's device.

The fix is a shared reference point plus a way for each format to report in.

Option A: one shared copy, plus your own

If the circle has the right to share a file, upload the PDF, EPUB, or audiobook under The book. People who want to read in Circle Read open it in the Reader, where they see each other's notes and faces on the page and can turn on Read together.

Everyone else reads their own copy and logs progress. Both groups appear on the same ribbon.

Option B: everyone reads their own copy

If there is no shared file, that is fine. On the circle page, each person taps Reading on paper or a Kindle? and logs where they are:

• Paper: the page number, and the total pages in their edition.
• Kindle: the percentage at the bottom of the page.
• Another app or audiobook: the percentage.

Circle Read turns these into one progress ribbon, so the group can see who is where regardless of edition. The spoiler guard uses each person's logged progress too, so it protects paper and Kindle readers in Home, Discuss, and the Reader.

Bring Kindle highlights into the circle

Kindle readers can share what they marked. Connect your Kindle to a computer, find My Clippings.txt in its documents folder, and import it in Circle Read. Your highlights and notes become margin notes for the circle, and duplicates are skipped if you import again later.

Audiobook listeners

Listeners can log a percentage like anyone else. If the circle has added the audiobook, they can also follow along under the page in the Reader, or the host can play it for everyone in the Player, where the whole circle hears the same minute. See synced audiobook listening for book clubs.

Talk about the text, not the page number

In meetings and threads, refer to chapters and scenes rather than page numbers: "the bit in chapter six where the letter arrives." When someone reads a passage aloud, others can find it in their own edition.

A quick setup checklist

• Decide whether you will share a file under The book
• Ask everyone not reading in the app to log their progress each week
• Invite Kindle readers to import their clippings before each meeting
• Set the weekly pace so every format has the same landing zone

Create a free circle and let everyone read their way. The conversation is what you share.