Gosh, I've been having at least a couple of conversations per week (oftentimes more) with fellow writers looking to bring out their own Kindle(s), so I'll just quit yammering and copy/paste this blog post into my email replies. And here's hoping this may be of use or interest for you, also, dear reader-- I know that many of you are writers.
It's changing all the time, and there is more than one way to skin this cat, but so far, here is what I can tell you:
ROUTE #1
My Kindles as of 2014:
+ Metaphysical Odyssey into the Mexican Revolution;
+From Mexico to Miramar or, Across the Lake of Oblivion;
+ The Building of Quality;
+ Miraculous Air: Journey of a Thousand Miles through Baja California, the Other Mexico;
+ Podcasting for Writers
+ and the Spanish translation of my novel, El último príncipe del Imperio Mexicano.
UPDATE
and
Odisea metafísica hacia la Revolución Mexicana, Francisco I. Madero y su libro secreto, Manual espírita
My novel, The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire is also available in Kindle, but that was my publisher's doing (Unbridled Books).
1. Get your book's text into in a clean WORD.doc.
This was not easy for some of my older works, which were written in Wordperfect and, alas, converted to babble in .epub (see step #2.). And one was in a PDF that did not convert well either. Most of them had multiple corrections made after it had landed in my original publisher's hands-- and to the galleys, as well. Oh well, I got it done.
2. Convert the WORD doc to an .epub by using a free open source program such as Sigil.
Download Sigil here.
3. Using Sigil, arrange your table of contents and chapters.
There are a multitude of Sigil tutorials on the web, Google and ye shall find. (I hired an IT guy to help me on this-- and that did save some time and head-aches.)
***UPDATE. A reader writes: "I keep the process easy by setting the paragraph indents to .2 in .docx, then saving the file as Web Page, Filtered. It becomes an HTML file. Upload that rather than ePub (use for Smashwords)."
4. Open a Kindle direct account on amazon.com
Click here: https://kdp.amazon.com
You will need to provide your email, password, contact info and your bank account number-- they do need to be able to pay you!
5. Purchase an ISBN from Bowker at www.myidentifiers.com
(For a Kindle this is not absolutely necessary, however.)
6. Make a cover.
Amazon provides some free templates. You can do it yourself or hire someone. The Kindle Direct publishing website provides all the relevant guidelines here.
7. On Kindle direct on amazon.com, upload the description of your book, the files for your book's content (that would be the .epub you created with Sigil), and the cover. Select the rights territories, the price you want to charge, and then the button that says PUBLISH.
In about 12 hours, oftentimes less, you will be emailed the link to your book's page on amazon.com. Update your website, tweet, tell friends and family, etc etc etc.
ROUTE #2.
1. Get your book in a clean WORD.doc.
2. Open a CreateSpace account (this is part of amazon.com)
3. Follow the very easy instructions to do a print/on-demand paperback edition of your book. (You can do this yourself, hire someone to do it, or pay CreateSpace to do it.) Once that is all done, click the box that says "Make this a Kindle."
ROUTE #3
Multiple ebook editions all at once, for a fee, Smashwords does it all for you. I do not have experience with this.
+ + + + + + +
Related blog posts:
>Seven Reasons Ebooks will be Big in Mexico
> My Excellent (If Occasionally Head-Banging) E-Book Adventure (Note: this is from 2011, ancient history, but includes many crunchy links)
>Guest-Blogger Deborah Batterman: "Publish Or Perish: 5 Links on the New Digital Imperative"
P.S. See all my ebooks in English here and in Spanish here.
MY BIG FAT OPINION ABOUT KINDLE EDITIONS:
Because they are quick to download, easy to read (especially for older people who need larger type and travelers of all ages with sore shoulders) and cheap, whatever one's own opinion about them may be, to expect that they will not continue to erode the traditional book market is to fight the winds and the tides. For those who would lament the loss of bookstores and paper books, take heart! There is the rare book market! (Cherish those autographed first editions with their dust jackets intact!) I say, paper books are like horses and candles. With the coming of cars and electricity the roles of horses and candles in most people's daily lives vastly diminished; nonetheless, horses and candles have not disappeared and probably never will.
Ceteris paribus, I'll take the paper book. But ceteris paribus is rarely what's actually going on. I have been buying and reading Kindles (and iBooks and free PDFs from www.archive.org) at a rather voracious pace.
More links of relevance:
> To read Kindles, I use my iPad's free Kindle app.
> Cyberflanerie: Rare Books Entrepreneurship Edition
> Michael Suarez, SJ on the Flow of Books and Money and Information
> A Super Brief Introduction to the Opportunity Cost of Rare Book Collecting
> Your COMMENTS are always welcome.
I welcome you to register for my free newsletter which goes out every other month, more or less, with podcasts, best of the blog, upcoming workshops and more. Click here.
Like many readers, my book buying habits have been evolving with the digital revolution. As much as I adore the quirky character of my local independent bookstore, I now buy the majority of my books directly from the publisher, the author, or amazon.com. For price, convenience and selection, sorry, those factors usually outweigh beautiful shelves, the bodacious gift card selection, and the coffee (and let's face it, many of the indie bookstores are more café than bookstore). And another change: with the ease of on-line ordering, I've also been buying more rare books, off-beat and artist books, and, if not many, then many more self-published books. More than ever before, a book can do mighty well without a publisher and the traditional distribution channels, especially when the author can summon the savviness and stamina (it's not a lark in the park) to promote her book and when she can count on a loyal following from her workshops and newsletters. Just to give an idea of three successful self-published nonfiction niche books (in paper): check out Rose Rosetree (Aura Reading Through All Your Senses), Stephanie Bennett Vogt (Your Spacious Self) and Carol Olmstead (Feng Shui for Real Life). And, alas, more than ever before, large publishers, with their cumbersome and expensive scale, caught in the triple tsunami of recession, mergers and acquisitions, and the digital revolution, are passing up the chance to publish books that, a decade ago, would have been snapped up, and from an agent. Several of my writer friends who have had works published by notable houses have found their latest novels, memoirs and short story collections, accomplished as they are, going unsold--- not an encouraging development for anyone. So Deborah Batterman, one fine fiction writer, and a blogger (The Things She Thinks About), has a timely story to tell about taking her short story collection, Shoes, Hair, Nails (published in 2006 by Uccelli Press) digital. Over to you, Deborah-- SELF-PUBLISH(?) OR PERISH + 5 LINKS RE: THE NEW DIGITAL IMPERATIVE
Back in 2004, the National Endowment for the Arts published a survey with a curious finding: literary reading is down, creative writing is up. With the explosion of blogs and web sites (literary and otherwise), the impulse to write has gained not only a new medium but one that stands to grant immediate gratification: if you build it, they will come. By logical extension, self-published books are flying to the page via print-on-demand (POD) technology and/or being downloaded to the latest and greatest eBook devices. As a writer with a short story collection that went the ‘defunct-small-publisher’ route before it had a chance to get off the ground, do I seize the moment, hitch a ride on this wave of digital books? You don’t have to dig deep to find those stories of writers disappointed with traditional publishing experiences, who took the leap into self-publishing. Likewise for those writers who, frustrated by years of rejection, decided there has to be a better way. Call it timing. Call it faith. Call it going digital.
And yet I admit to some reservations about going full-throttle into digital DIY mode. As a reader I love the feel of a book in my hands, the reflective nature that seems diminished by the visual nature of reading on-screen. As a writer I love the way words take shape in my mind and on the page. The ‘page’ as it exists on a digital reader is not the same: differences in the technology that drives each eReader result in variances in formatting. If I go this route, am I sacrificing my sense of what a book IS and everything it takes to bring one to fruition? Yes. At the same time, as a writer seeking ways to increase my exposure, why not tap that market of readers shelving their paperbacks in favor of viewing books on portable screens? And even if my plunge into the world of self-published digital books carries the risk that my own work (now a thumbnail image in an eBookstore) may get lost in a sea of ‘vanity’ books, all it takes is one good wave to lift it out of the water.
1. It was a recent article in the Wall St. Journal, ‘Vanity’ Press Goes Digital, following on the heels of an e-mail I received re: Apple looking to give more presence to self-published authors in its iBookstore, that got me thinking, what if? Some of the key players noted in the WSJ article were listed as Apple-approved ‘aggregators’ (don’t you love that word?). A good starting point for choosing a publishing/distribution platform.
2. Aggregators offer a variety of services, both for indie publishers and authors going digital. I opted to go with Smashwords, mostly for its cross-platform technology and very user-friendly site. The Smashwords blog, maintained by founder Mark Coker, is a good source of information and links relevant to self-publishing. His July 13th post is worth reading for its insights on traditional publishing vs. self-publishing.
3. The rationale is even more colorfully spelled out by DIY success story Steve Almond in his column at The Rumpus, Presto Book-O (Why I Went Ahead and Self-Published). Using POD technology (Harvard Bookstore’s Espresso Book Machine), Almond produced books (with two covers) to be sold only at readings. Sometimes less really is more.
4. The bottom line: As Diane Gedymin, founder of The Publisher’s Desk, noted at BookExpo America 2010: The Changing DIY Ethos, some 83 percent of Americans dream of writing a book. Ninety-three percent of those who actually make the effort and get published via traditional channels will sell less than 1,000 books. There’s a reason that taking a more proactive role in controlling the means of publishing and distribution is on the rise.
5. All of which brings me back to a simple premise: yes, writing (unless it’s in a journal or diary, for the writer’s eyes only) demands an audience, and yet the impulse to write – steadily, draft after draft, with heart and skill that (hopefully) matures with time – demands solitary hours in a room of one’s own. For a reminder of what drives that impulse, I’ll go back to Janet Sternburg’s The Writer on Her Work, in particular one essay that sparkles with Didion-esque insight, "Why I Write." And all it takes is one click of the mouse to bring readers right to Amazon, and into the book.
--- Deborah Batterman
To read about and order the e-book of her collection, Shoes, Hair, Nails, click here.
For the archive of Madam Mayo guest-blog posts, click here.
