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Kindle allows anyone wanting to publish their books for free to be able to do and it’s not just new writers who are taking advantage; one writer recently announced a little while ago that he would be leaving his publisher so that he could self-publish. Whether you’re just starting out, or make a living out of writing, there are a few things to bear in mind before publishing.
This has been written presuming that you already have a manuscript and artwork ready. If you don’t have artwork ready, don’t worry: it’s not essential. These are the first few steps for publishing, I’ll write a second part with the next stages.
First is the editing. It is easy to miss something even if you have read it over countless times and editing from the PC screen is even harder. Print off a copy, edit it on paper, and do the editing with a fresh pair of eyes. It might be a good idea to leave your work for a few days and look at it again and perhaps have someone else read it over as they may pick out something you don’t.
It is always a good idea to get someone to read the work over for you. You might think that you’ve been perfectly clear in what you are writing but it might not be clear to others not so familiar with your subject.
Books with covers tend to sell better so adding artwork is a good idea. However, this isn’t essential as Amazon will allow you to publish on Amazon without one, and Amazon will add a basic book cover image for you, which will include the title and your name on a basic coloured background. To get started on designing a cover, you can easily import any of your artwork or photos into Word. If you don’t have Word then you could download Openoffice for free or look for free software online; many sites offer free trial versions.
Once your artwork is imported, all you need do is add the title and your name where you want it on the cover and save it.. Some fonts don’t work well in Kindle so you need to read the Kindle guidelines for further information on acceptable fonts.
With your manuscript ready, and your art work completed, you are nearly ready to publish on Kindle.
(Part 2 to follow)
If you want to read part two, you can find it by going to my profile at:
http://expertscolumn.com/users/jane789
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Comments
Good read. You're right; it's easy to get carried away and publish your Kindle ebook without fully editing it first. I have been publishing since 2011 and always make sure everything looks neat before hitting that publish button. Is editing boring? Absolutely, but it will also save you a lot of hassle (and poor reviews) later down the road.
Exactly.
You're quite right about editing. One major difference between self-publishing and going through a publisher is that you don't have the safety net of an editor to catch any errors you make, or to suggest improvements. It's completely up to you.
Have you self-published through the Kindle Store yourself? It would be interesting to hear of wrinkles and pitfalls (and how to avoid them) from someone who has done it.
I've published a book which including some stories from my news site and I'm just about to publish a short story on there which should be up over the weekend. I'll let you know about the wrinkles and pitfalls then - there's bound to be a few.
I have a full length novel which just needs editing but thought I'd learn the publishing process by publishing my short stories first.
As for editing, I dread missing something, but at least with Kindle you can go in and edit it anytime.