Anyone else out there publish direct to Kindle?

valeriec80

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Yesterday, I uploaded a manuscript to Kindle, and instead of the typical message which says that your book will be available in the store in 24 to 36 hours, it now says that books are being "reviewed" and to check back in 5 business days to see IF my book was published.

I'm not sure what they could be reviewing exactly. I do know that formatting for the Kindle is a royal pain in the butt. Maybe they're going to make sure your book doesn't look like crap (which is what happens if you upload anything but html to it.) Maybe they're looking for things like copyright pages or ISBNs or something. ???

Anyway, I was a bit annoyed at the delay. Several of my readers really prefer Kindle, and they now have to wait to buy the book. It makes me look bad too, because I had announced a date the book would be published, and it's not going to be published on that date.

I wish they would have let me know they were doing this before they did it.
 

valeriec80

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I don't believe that smashwords could actually take my microsoft word file and turn it into something that actually looks good on Kindle. Kindle takes love and care and html.

I do use smashwords--for everything else.

But...maybe I'm wrong? Anyone here actually read a smashwords file on their kindle? Did it look okay?
 
JerseyGirl1962

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valeriec80 said:
I don't believe that smashwords could actually take my microsoft word file and turn it into something that actually looks good on Kindle. Kindle takes love and care and html.

I do use smashwords--for everything else.

But...maybe I'm wrong? Anyone here actually read a smashwords file on their kindle? Did it look okay?
Click to expand...

I'm not sure I understand your question (it's probably just me, lol).

I just bought 2 books off of Smashwords over the weekend; I prefer them because I can pay thru PayPal. Anyway, there's a listing of the different formats those books were available in, one of which was Kindle (mobi, I think).

I have the Kindle app for PCs, not the standalone Kindle. Formatting on both books look fine.

Not sure that answered your question.

As to help with formatting, there's this on the Smashwords distribution page:

Get a Referral to an Ebook Formatter or Cover Image Designer

Mark Coker has created a short list of Smashwords authors who provide low cost formatting and cover design services for fellow Smashwords authors. If you would like to receive the list, send an email to [email protected] and you'll receive it via instant autoresponder. We don't receive a referral fee, and we cannot warrant their work. We provide this list as a service to you. The reason we recommend them is because other Smashwords authors have been satisfied with them. Also understand that you're hiring them, not Smashwords, and your payment to them does not entitle you to special fast-track handling of your book or priority customer service.


Nancy
 

valeriec80

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Dude. This thread is like two years old. Things have way changed.

While I still have kindle formatting issues from MS Word documents, I'm usually able to correct the problems. And I do let smashwords do kindle conversion for me these days.
 
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