Blended books on your e-reader
Read a book that is part Spanish. Look up any word you don't know and see the English it replaced.
A blended book swaps a share of its words — usually one in five — into the language you are learning, picked so the sentence around each one still carries the meaning. You read in a language you know and meet the new one where context does most of the work.
Each book comes with a companion dictionary. Your reader already knows how to look words up; the dictionary just teaches it these words. Free, no account, nothing installed.
Which reader do you have?
The book is an ordinary EPUB, so it opens anywhere. Looking words up on the page and sending clipped words back needs a reader we can talk to.
CrossPoint
Works fullyOpen firmware for Xteink X3, X4, X4 Classic and X4 Pro, and the other devices it supports
Everything: blended books, the companion dictionary, and words you clip syncing back into the app.
Any other EPUB reader
Books onlyKobo, PocketBook, Kindle via conversion, phone apps
The blended book itself — it is an ordinary EPUB. Looking a word up and clipping need firmware we cannot install.
DinoReader
In the pipelineIn conversation with its author
Nothing yet. The companion dictionary is the part that should travel first.
Xteink
In the pipelineThe firmware these readers ship with, before CrossPoint
Nothing yet. We are working out what the stock firmware can do on its own.
Everything below is written for CrossPoint, the only reader where the whole loop is verified end to end. On any other reader, follow the USB step for the book and skip the rest — the book itself works today. We add a reader here only once it genuinely works, never on an announcement.
Blend any book, in any language
This is the part that is yours. With Pro you choose: a classic in the language you read, or your own pasted text, any of our 17 languages, and how much gets swapped. You get back a book plus its own dictionary, built for you and matched to the words you already know.
Pair your reader once and your books appear on the device itself, no copying. Words you clip while reading sync straight back into your practice. Needs a free LingoBlend account, and Pro to blend a whole book — the ready-made library below needs neither.
Uses the same monthly Smart Blend allowance as the app. The on-device part needs CrossPoint 1.7 or a Nightly build.
Or start with a ready-made one
Free, no account. Download the book and its dictionary — you need both. Want a different book, or a different language? That is the next section.
The Great Gatsby
F. Scott Fitzgerald
43,195 words · 9 chapters · 8,899 words swapped into Spanish
Getting it onto your reader
Copy both files to the SD card
Connect the reader by USB and choose Home → File Transfer → USB Drive. The card appears on your computer — no card reader needed.
- Put the .epub in
Books - Unzip the dictionary into
dictionaries, so you end up with/dictionaries/lingoblend-…/holding three files
Eject the card, then leave File Transfer mode.
Select the dictionary
Settings → Reader → Dictionary, and choose the lingoblend-… entry.
You only do this once per book. If it is not in the list, the three files are not together in one folder under /dictionaries.
Read, and look up anything
Open the book. Blended words are underlined. Look one up the way your firmware does it:
- 1.6.x — Reader Menu → Look Up, then tap a word
- 1.7 and newer — press and hold a word, then Look Up
You will see the word it replaced and its base form — tapping mantuvo gives held · mantener.
Two ways to skip the copying
Books over the air
Your reader can download books straight from our catalog. Settings → System → OPDS Servers → Add Server, and enter the URL including https:// — a bare address defaults to http and will not connect.
https://www.lingoblend.app/opds/root.xml
Pick the underlined edition. Dictionaries cannot travel over OPDS — the protocol only carries books — so that file still goes by USB, or by plugin.
Dictionaries over the air
Our plugin puts every dictionary one tap away. In the reader's File Transfer web UI, open the Plugin Store and add:
https://www.lingoblend.app/crosspoint/catalog.json
Then Settings → System → Plugins → LingoBlend Dictionaries downloads the one you pick straight into /dictionaries.
Or copy a plugin by USB
The same files, no store involved. Unzip into a folder called plugins at the top level of the card, so you end up with /plugins/lingoblend/. Eject, then look under Settings → System → Plugins, restarting the reader if it is not listed yet. If you already installed one from a store, you do not need this — and do not do both.
Plugins need CrossPoint 1.7 or a Nightly build however you install them. On 1.6.x the USB steps further up still get you the book and its dictionary, which is everything except clipping.
Words you clip come back into the app
This is the part that makes a blended book worth reading on an e-reader rather than in the app. Clip a word while you read; it lands in your LingoBlend dictionary and starts coming up in practice. Nothing to type in again.
- 1
Install the plugin and sign in — once
In the reader's File Transfer web UI, open the Plugin Store and add:
https://www.lingoblend.app/crosspoint/catalog.jsonInstall LingoBlend — the one without “Dictionaries” in the name. Then on the reader: Settings → System → Plugins → LingoBlend → Sign in, and scan the QR code it shows. That also puts every book you blend one tap away.
- 2
Clip while you read
Press and hold a word and choose Clip. It is written to the card instantly — no network, nothing to wait for. Clip as many as you like; up to 200 a day sync to your account.
- 3
Put the reader on your WiFi
Home → File Transfer → Join a Network, then pick your network. It shows a URL like
http://192.168.1.50.Not Create Hotspot — that makes the reader its own network, so it has no way to reach us.
- 4
Open that URL and press Sync
On your phone or laptop, on the same WiFi, open the address. Go to File Manager (the ☰ menu), find the LingoBlend card, and press Sync clippings.
- 5
They are in the app
Open the Dictionary tab. A word you clipped from a blended book keeps the meaning the book gave it — we already know what it replaced, so nothing is re-translated and no sense is guessed at.
Syncing twice is safe
Only the new part of the file is sent, and nothing is ever saved twice. Your clippings file is never deleted — it stays on the card, readable, in the same format a Kindle uses.
Sentences are skipped
Anything longer than a few words is counted and skipped. A sentence is not a dictionary entry, and we would rather tell you than quietly fill your practice with passages.
Things worth knowing
- Ordinary words return “not found”. Is that broken?
- No. Your reader uses one dictionary at a time, and while a LingoBlend dictionary is selected it only knows the words this book blended. Switch back in Settings when you finish the book.
- Which firmware do I need?
- 1.6.0 or newer for the books and dictionaries — that is when dictionary lookup shipped. The plugins, and saving words as you read, need 1.7 or a Nightly build.
- Can I blend my own book?
- Yes, with Pro. Pick a classic or paste your own text at your readers, choose a language and how much to blend, and it arrives on your reader with its own dictionary. It draws on the same monthly Smart Blend allowance as the app, not a separate limit.
- Can I save words while I read?
- Yes, on CrossPoint 1.7 or a Nightly build. Press and hold a word and choose Clip — it saves to the card instantly, no network. Then put the reader on your WiFi (File Transfer → Join a Network), open the address it shows, and press Sync clippings on the LingoBlend card in File Manager; the words land in your dictionary and your practice. The steps above spell this out. On older firmware, words you save in the app or the browser extension all land in the same place.
- Does this cost anything?
- No. These books are public domain, the dictionaries are generated from them, and none of it needs an account.
Blend anything, not just these books
The app turns any article, page or document into the same kind of reading — and remembers every word you save.