Have Formatted Book and Cover--Now What? [Uploading to Kindle]

Tri, what kind of formatting did they do? What size is the cover? Where all are you going to/want to publish?

I don't know anything about Libre Office (I send in everything via Word) but I do know you'll need to remove the "Smashwords Edition" verbiage unless you're submitting to Smashwords. Change the notation to read "Amazon Edition" or "Kindle Edition".

For PubIt!, naturally, you'll want to change it to "PubIt! Edition".

triceretops said:

I don't know what kind of formatting he did. When I open the file he sent me it goes to Microsoft Word Web APP. Whatever that is. I imagine I would have to download and save it in a file to determine how it's been formatted. How do I determine this?

The cover is a JPEG 1875 by 2500--395 kb

Yes, when I saw the "Smashwords Edition" I kind of freaked, because that's something that Kindle wouldn't want in there.

Does that mean it's formatted only for Smashwords, according to their formatting engine? Jesus.

Now even if it's formatted for Smashwords, isn't there a provision that allows it to be converted over to Amazon Kindle?

tri

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erg. Smashwords formatting is horrid for kindle. Even their mobi files are so fked up.

But if it's formatted for Smashwords, that's the toughest place to get it properly done.

If you open it on Libre, all the formatting should still be the same. I wouldn't worry about that. Smashwords only accepts .doc files. Make sure you don't convert it to any other format but .doc.

Do you care if the cover is inside the book? If not, save the file twice. Once for smashwords. So save as *insertnamehere*-smashwords and again as *insertnamehere*-kindle.

The Smashwords one needs the ISBN they assign you.

The Kindle one, just remove the smashwords copyright info and you can upload it as is. If you want the cover inside the book, the only way I know to do that is through an html save.

Thing is, if you're uploading to kindle, you want to find out if your friend has created a proper table of contents and inserted the code that leads to the table of contents, the start of the book and the end of the book. (there's special codes for that).

And once you've uploaded to kindle, you can preview the file (don't use the preview on the kdp site, download the preview (there's an option for that) and then open that in kindleforpc or send it to your kindle if you have one. Once you've got the preview up, click EVERY link and make sure they all work and that there are no errors.

Lemme know how you do from here. And if you PM me, we can chat on googlechat if you want.

triceretops said:

ETA. Well, I would like it available for as many versions for the different online retailers as possible, but I don't understand the perplexities of doing that for all the versions. If I go KDP, it looks like that means it will be exclusive to only Amazon. I don't know what the benefits to that are, as opposed to going with the others.

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KDP select is okay, I guess. It gives you 5 days to offer your book for free. It's wouldn't be my choice because not everyone has, or can get, a kindle worldwide. But that's a personal choice because I market to a niche that has a lot of worldwide buyers.

triceretops said:

Okay, just finished my Amazon Account page and saved it. It doesn't lead anywhere after that. Now where? Bookshelf? To add a book?

Sorry, just talking out loud here trying to get through this cluster you-know-what.

tri

ETA: Just found the publisher code hiding down in the lower right hand corner of the Account page. I suppose I'll need that, so wrote it down.

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Yes, bookshelf to add the book. Then just follow the instructions on page there.

As for kdp select, not sure about the price changes, I think you can do that no matter what. Offering it for free, no. You can't do that at all unless you're with kdp select.

The pay by check thing is awful. There's tons of complaints about it. Especially since you cannot get money made on amazon.com or amazon.co.uk transferred into euro accounts. You have to have an american bank account for the amazon.com or a uk one for the amazon.co.uk. (you can have the amazon.co.uk monies deposited in your american bank account). Otherwise, it's a check. Frustrating since it costs $70 to cash a check here in Sweden.

Btw for uploading to smashwords you HAVE to have that smashwords copyright info on there.

It's poor form to leave the SW notice in the Kindle edition. If I were paying for formatting, I'd request the formatter send versions with and without it.

But in the long-run it will be very valuable to you to know whether you can do minor edits in your LibreOffice and resave without adversely affecting the overall file. Now's as good a time as any to know that.

KDP Select is an optional program within KDP. So you'll have the option to enroll in the program if you choose, but you still set up KDP the same either way and upload your book the same either way. Once uploaded, you'll have the option to enter Select (which, as noted, isn't allowed if you put your book on BN, SW or anywhere else so you can safely ignore the option.)

triceretops said:

I got all the way up to the book file download (got the cover in there) and then it went into "Conversion Failure" after about five minutes of trying to convert. I should have known, nothing would or could be that easy for me. Although it says to try again later, I have a feeling something is wonky somewhere and I don't have the skill or knowledge to know what that might be.

I will try again, I guess.

tri

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Try saving it as an html file, Tri. Just save as "Web page, filtered" and upload that file. See if you have better luck.

Smashwords requires a "Smashwords Edition" in the front matter (or the back). For Kindle, you need to delete this--you don't need to add an "Amazon Edition" notice.

If your book is formatted for Smashwords, it probably doesn't have page breaks between chapters, front matter, etc.--which you need for Kindle. If you paid to have someone format the book for you, he/she should have given you files to support all formats.

Before you publish, make sure you download the free Kindle Previewer (not just the preview after you upload your prc file to Kindle) and check your work for all available formats. Any mistakes will show up here.

If you or the formatter did all the Smashwords formatting as suggested by their guide, save it as a "html (unfiltered)" file in Word, then convert the html (unfiltered file) into a .mobi file using Calibre, and all of the proper page breaks and everything will be automatically formatted for you.

Best of luck to you, Tri!

Look inside doesn't format the same way as the kindle hardware, not even all that close.

If you don't have the hardware I've found this to be the pecking order for software:

Kindle Previewer (very close)

Kindle Reader for PC (passable)

Amazon.com Look Inside (not good)

I haven't tried that, but if you can the main things to check are that the TOC looks right and the links work, the chapter breaks work okay, that external links (if any, like to your author site in the About The Author) work okay, and that the left/right margins on the main text appear correct. If you had sections with unique formatting of any type (say an embedded poem with centering or something) check that kind of thing too.

You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle ebooks. Amazon has a free app you can download to your computer and then use it to read Kindle books. I highly recommend it to check formatting if you don't have a Kindle (I have a Kindle, so I haven't tried the app, but I've been told it works great).