Read
An AI ebook reader that reads the whole book, chapter by chapter
Most AI tools answer a question about a book from whichever fragments a search pulled out of it. This one reads the book: it finds its way by chapter, leaves notes in the margin as it works through it with you, and every answer quotes the passage it came from.
- Opens
- EPUB · .mobi · .azw3 (DRM-free)
- Notes
- In your folder’s .mindmax, not a server
- Runs on
- macOS (Apple silicon) · Windows
- Price
- Free app · AI plans from $10/mo, or your own key
- AI
- Included, or your own API key
A book is where AI reading tools most often fall over. A paper fits in one go; a 400-page book does not, so most tools chop it into fragments, retrieve a few, and answer from those. That works for "what does the author say about X" and fails for every question that is actually about the book — where the argument turns, what the author walks back later, which chapter contradicts which.
It reads the book before it answers
Where does the argument turn? What does the author walk back in the last chapter? Does chapter nine contradict chapter two? Those answers live across chapters, not in any one fragment — so a keyword or vector search, which returns the few fragments closest to your wording, has nothing to find. Reading the book does.
- It starts where you would: the contents. The chapter map comes from the table of contents the book was published with, tidied so a title wrapper or a chapter number split from its name does not get in the way.
- From that map it works out which chapters the question needs, then reads them in full — whole sections with the structure around them intact, not paragraph-sized scraps.
- If what it read does not settle the question, it goes back to the map and opens another chapter, the way you would flip back to check something.
- Every answer lists what was read, so “the book does not say” and “it did not look” are never the same answer.
A quote opens on the passage, not just the chapter
“It is somewhere in chapter nine” is not a citation. The sentence itself, highlighted in the book — that is.
- Every quote names the book and the chapter it came from. Click the marker in an answer and a card shows the quoted sentences highlighted in their surrounding text, without leaving the chat.
- Press Open source and the book jumps to that passage with the quote highlighted, so you can read on from there. Or copy the quote as it stands.
- Quotes are verbatim and checked against the book before you see them. A claim whose quote does not match the text is dropped or sent back, not shown to you with a straight face.
- The same works for questions asked across a folder: a quote from a book opens on its passage, a quote from a PDF on its page.
An AI that reads it with you, chapter by chapter
A 400-page book is not a question. It is a week of reading, and it helps to know where to slow down and what to argue with.
- Pick a lens — guide, review, critique or study — and it works through the book a chapter at a time, leaving notes in the margin beside the passages they are about. You can read along as they arrive.
- Ticks on the scroll bar show where every note sits, so you can see which chapters carry the argument before you start.
- Stop whenever you like and keep what it has done. The closing write-up says which chapters it rests on, what was most worth taking away and where it lives, the strongest question left open, and how the book connects to other things you have read.
- Adopt the notes worth keeping as your own comments — they outlive any later pass, and they stay in your folder.
A book in a language you do not read well
Translating a book a chapter at a time in a chat window gets you three different words for the same term by chapter nine.
- Start it once and the whole book is translated. A glossary is drawn up first and waits for you to confirm it, so a term stays the same word from the first chapter to the last.
- Read the translation side by side with the original, and switch between the translations you have made of the same book.
- It works through the book in checkpointed segments, so an interruption picks up where it stopped instead of starting over.
Kindle books open as books
A shelf of .mobi and .azw3 files is the most common reason a reading tool is no use to someone who has been buying ebooks for a decade.
- A Kindle file is turned into a proper EPUB the first time you open it, and everything after that — chapters, annotations, quotes, clicking back to the passage — works exactly as it does for any other book.
- The contents come from the table of contents the book was published with, rather than from guessing at which lines look like headings, so a converted book has the same chapter navigation an EPUB does.
- The conversion happens once, quietly, and the original file in your folder is left alone.
- Chapter navigation
- Highlights that stay put
- AI notes in the margin
- Quotes that open on the passage
And the ordinary reading, done properly
It is a reader, not a PDF viewer that happens to open EPUBs.
Reflowable, the way an ebook should be
Your own font size, and a contents panel to jump by chapter.
Highlights that stay put
Anchored to the passage and kept in your folder, not on a server — still correct after the book is re-extracted or reopened.
Select a passage, ask or explain
Ask about just that passage, or press Explain for a plain reading of it. The chapter it sits in goes with the question.
Box a diagram and ask
A figure or table in the middle of chapter nine can be boxed and asked about. The region remembers the chapter, so the answer gets you back to the right place in a 400-page book.
Find in the book
Search the whole book from inside it and land on the passage, not on a chapter heading.
In your folder, not on a server
Highlights, reading passes with their write-ups and the AI notes you adopted are kept in the folder’s .mindmax directory, next to everything else MindMax stores there. They do not depend on an account.
Coming from an ebook reader app: what changes, what stays
Most people who land here read on a phone, a tablet or an e-ink device, in the app that came with their store. Here is what reading a book here changes — including the rows where that app wins.
| Topic | An ebook reader appThe store’s app, on a phone, tablet or e-reader | In MindMax |
|---|---|---|
| Where the books are | In the app’s library, usually tied to its store. | EPUB and DRM-free Kindle files in a folder you choose, opened in place. |
| Getting a book | A store built in, one tap away. | No store. Books a store locks with DRM cannot be opened here. |
| Help while reading | A dictionary, search, sometimes a built-in assistant. | An AI that finds its way through the whole book by chapter, annotates it with you, and quotes the passage behind every answer. |
| Highlights and notes | Kept by the app and its sync service. | Anchored to the passage and kept in your folder’s .mindmax directory — yours, and the AI notes you chose to adopt. No account, no sync service. |
| Another language | Word-by-word lookups. | The whole book translated with its terminology held steady, read beside the original. |
| After the last page | Your highlights. | Your highlights, a closing write-up, and a book you can ask about alongside everything else in the folder. |
| Where you read | Phone, tablet or e-ink, with your place synced between them. | Desktop only — macOS and Windows. |
| Hours at a stretch | An e-ink screen is easier on the eyes. | A computer screen, at the font size you choose. |
One part of a loop: read, think, write
Your notes, and the two hundred PDFs you read to write them, sit in one folder — where a single AI works across both. Tools you would otherwise stitch together each hold one half of that.
- ReadThis pageRead the book here — navigated by chapter, annotated with you, with quotes that open on the passage.
- ThinkLay the book out as an overview on a canvas beside it, then grow branches from the passages you select.
- WriteWrite about it in Markdown in the same folder, and quotes from the book keep their chapter.
Where it gets hard
- Working through an entire book costs real credits
A full pass over 400 pages is a large job, not a question. Try it on one book before committing a shelf — see pricing for what the weekly allowance covers.
- DRM-protected ebooks cannot be opened
MindMax reads ordinary EPUB files and DRM-free Kindle files. Books bought from a store that keeps them locked stay locked — that lock is not ours to remove.
- Badly built books degrade chapter navigation
Broken chapter metadata, a whole book in one giant file, or an older Kindle file that never had a contents page leaves nothing to navigate by. The book is readable; chapter-level navigation, where most of the advantage comes from, is not.
- Fiction is not what this is for
The lenses are built around argument and evidence. It will summarise a novel; it has nothing useful to say about whether the novel is any good.
Common questions
Can it read an entire book rather than answer one question about it?
Yes. Pick a lens — guide, review, critique or study — and it works through the whole book chapter by chapter, leaving notes in the margin as it goes and closing with a write-up. You can stop it at any point and keep what it has done.
How is that different from pasting a book into a chatbot?
Most books are longer than can be held at once, so something has to decide what gets read. Here the book is navigated by its chapter map, the chapters that bear on a question are read in full, and every answer quotes the passage it rests on, one click from the page.
Can I translate an EPUB?
Yes, the whole book in one run. A glossary is drawn up first for you to confirm, so terminology stays consistent throughout, and you read the translation side by side with the original.
Where do the annotations live?
In your own folder, anchored to the passage in the book. They stay correct after the book is re-extracted or reopened and they are still there if you stop using MindMax.
Can it open Kindle files (.mobi, .azw3)?
Yes, as long as they are not DRM-protected. A Kindle file is converted into a proper EPUB the first time you open it, and from then on it behaves like any other book: chapters, annotations, quotes and jumping back to the source all work the same way. Files bought from the Kindle store carry DRM and cannot be opened.
Does reading a book cost credits?
Opening, reading, highlighting and searching your own books never spend credits. Asking, explaining, a reading pass or a translation is AI work and does — or runs on your own API key.
See also
Guide, critique and study — plus a review written to the author. What each one marks, and what it writes up at the end.
A book overview laid out on a canvas beside the book, then expanded from the passages you select.
Terminology held steady across 300 pages, and the translation read against the original.
The same reading tools on papers and reports, with quotes that land on the page.
Boxing a diagram inside a chapter, and what travels with the box besides the picture.
The whole workflow, from the first chapter to notes you will still use.