I am a fan of translated fiction and I find it very enjoyable to escape to far off places and discover a culture and scenery that is different to my own. Translated fiction opens up next experiences, places, tastes and themes that are not native to me.
I enjoy Latin American, Asian and Mainland European authors. My reading of these is dependent on translations as I am unable to read Italian, Spanish, Japanese etc. I love discovering a new series and getting into it. Since I switched to reading via a Kindle in 2018, early on I discovered a series written by the author Marco Vichi. Commisario Bordelli – which follows a Commisario in Florence investigating crimes and dealing with the ghosts of Italy’s fascist past. It quickly became one of my favourite series and I quickly got through all six translated works. But that was back in 2018, and since then unfortunately no further books in that series have been translated. So I have been stuck reading the same six books several times… until an epiphany moment this week.
I was talking to a friend and they mentioned why not use AI or tools to translate the books that remain untranslated into English… Why had I not thought of it before? So I had a go and purchased a book online and gave it a try. I will say this, I absolutely hate DRM (Digital Rights Management on digital purchases and purely for my own personal reasons to retain a copy for my own library I remove this lock from every book I buy. In order to do what I did I had to remove the DRM.) and so after purchasing my copy I removed it and I discovered on Calibre (ebook library software) there is a translation plug in you can set up to translate books that are stored in the Library. I have it a go and you know what? It worked! The book translated with no issue and it is almost perfect, perhaps there is the occasionally formatting issue like a misaligned “” but it is perfectly readable from the chapters I have read so far.
I am delighted to have access to an otherwise hidden World to me, and revisit an old friend for some fresh adventures.
Whilst it does go against the spirit of copyright etc, this is only for personal use and enjoyment and only for items I purchase.
Valley Reviews 