Are some ebook creation progs that I've heard about any good

ajenery

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Apologies if something similar to this has been covered elsewhere. I've already been given some great advice as to how to go about formatting ebooks myself using styles, etc - but as an alternative route or avenue I've also been looking-up 'ebook creation software..' on SE's and came across some of them; Atavist, eBook Maestro, Ultimate eBook Creator and others. Just wondering if members on AW have used any of these and if they are any good.
 

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No "pushbutton" software is going to give you a decently formatted e-book, IMO; you still have to do the work yourself. Typically, that means learning how to use styles, regardless of the software.

I recommend learning some HTML and using Sigil to format an ePub file. I upload those directly to KDP and through Smashwords or D2D everywhere else.
 

ajenery

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Then what's the point of these editors? There's quite a few. One may as well stay with word or openoffice-writer. You say you upload epub's to kdp?
 
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amergina

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I adore Vellum (which is only available for the Mac). I could handcode, but Vellum does a good job at formatting for the different file types and a reasonable job at paperback formatting.
 

M. H. Lee

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Second the recommendation of Vellum. I had 50+ books to format so bought a used Mac for $250. But for three and half years prior to that I just used Word and styles and was fine. Also, you might want to check out Draft2Digital's ebook formatting options. Free to use and you can take them to other platforms including Amazon.
 

WriterBN

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Then what's the point of these editors? There's quite a few. One may as well stay with word or openoffice-writer. You say you upload epub's to kdp?
For the most part, there isn't one. If you're publishing to KDP, there are really two choices:

1. Use Word or another word processor equivalent. This requires learning how to format correctly, using styles for everything. Then upload a .doc or .docx file to KDP.

2. For complete control over the format, learn HTML and use Sigil (or Jutoh or another ePub editor), and upload a validated ePub to KDP.

Either way, there's a minimum amount of work that you have to do yourself.
 

Laer Carroll

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... For complete control over the format, learn HTML and use Sigil (or Jutoh or another ePub editor), and upload a validated ePub to KDP.

You don't have to learn a lot of HTML, just the very basics. You should only apply a minimum of HTML formatting to your text. Being an expert, I do a fair amount but am aware that the readers of my ebooks may override whatever I specify as the initial font and font size of my text, so I avoid anything more complex than basic formatting such as bold and italics.

Sigil has a nice feature called split screen, where you can see both the content as it will appear in your ebook reader and the HTML underlying it.
 
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WriterBN

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You don't have to learn a lot of HTML, just the very basics.
True, but if you know more than the basics, it's a lot easier to troubleshoot if you run into problems. I've been working with HTML/CSS and XML for a long while, so I naturally gravitated toward an HTML-based workflow for e-books.

Sigil has a nice feature called split screen, where you can see both the content as it will appear in your ebook reader and the HTML underlying it.
I haven't seen that feature, unless you mean the Preview pane, which I do find useful. I generally work in code view.
 

Laer Carroll

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...if you know more than the basics, it's a lot easier to troubleshoot if you run into problems.

If someone is an expert like us, that's true. But most writers are not, and need to get their books out with as little time and effort as possible. THEY only need the very minimum HTML, and shouldn't be made to feel they have to go full-court tech expert to do what should be a fairly simple process. Leaving them able to spend all their time on writing their next book.