I am going to go back and do an edited version of my first novel. My question is about formatting. If i choose to do it through Amazon again, do they actually do formatting? Can i send them my manuscript and they will add all of the formatting necessary? or is there some template I need to follow when writing the new version? I apologize if this did not belong here, but I was not sure where else to put it.
Edits for Self-Publishing?
- Thread starter Overkill
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No, you have to do all the formatting yourself. Amazon has a great, if somewhat basic tool called Kindle Create. I'm putting together a small tutorial on my blog, and will post the link once it's done.
If you work on a Mac, there's a program called Vellum that supposedly does a wonderful job formatting ebooks (not a Mac user, so I don't know.) I believe you can also upload your ms. to Draft2Digital and it will spit out a MOBI formatted doc for you (and you don't have to upload through them.)
Amazon is a retailer, not a publisher (unless you are contracted to their publishing imprints). If you are going through KDP (their self-publishing arm) they do nothing but pay you your part of royalties. Everything else is your responsibility.
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That's nice of you to take the time to do this.
I format my own books. When I first started self-publishing formatting intimidated me because it seemed harder than it actually turned out to be. Now it's so easy I don't even think twice when doing it. It's second-nature now.
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I recently ran a kindle formatted book through Amazon's automatic formatting for KDP Print and was surprised to find it did a pretty good job.