E-Publishing: Who I Use for Editing, Formatting, and Cover Art Design

Every now and then, someone emails and asks for recommendations on editors, cover art designers, and ebook formatting folks, so here’s a quick run down on who I’m currently using.

Editing

A few months ago, I did a post on how editing (and hiring an editor) works when you’re self-publishing, so you may want to take a peek at that if you’re new to things. It’ll give you an idea about which level of editing you may need, and it talks a bit about prices (though there’s a huge variation from editor to editor).

I’ve tried four or five different editors since I got started e-publishing, and, for the last four novels, I’ve used Shelley Holloway. She’s been freelancing for a while, and her rates aren’t the cheapest you’ll find, but, for me, it’s been worth paying more. She always seems to catch more typos, missing words, etc.. When I used a different editor for a short story last winter, I even had a reader point out that it had more errors than she was used to in my novels.

Cover Art

I don’t think I’ve done a write-up on how selecting a cover-art designer works, but I did figure out, through trial and error, that it’s helpful to get someone who has experience doing books. You can make a cool cover out of a custom illustration, but it saves some headaches if you use someone who handles lettering/fonts as well and gets that, especially with ebooks, the cover should look good in a thumbnail version as well as a full-sized one.

I tried a couple of different people before finding Glendon Haddix, the fellow who does the Flash Gold and Emperor’s Edge books for me (he redid Encrypted last year too). He’s also done the covers and interior formatting for my paperbacks. I believe he does ebook formatting now too. One-stop shopping.

Ebook Formatting

This is something that a lot of indie authors learn to do themselves, but, if you’re like me and prefer to outsource the non-creative work, you can find lots of folks offering formatting services. $100 or so (for a full-length manuscript) seems to be about average, but you can find bargains out there too.

Glendon and Shelley both offer ebook formatting now, as an add-on to their other services, but I started out using Ted Risk over at Dellaster Design, and I’ve stuck with him. He does a good job and he also has the files to all my earlier books, so it’s easy to have him update the old ones at the same time (as you publish more work, you’ll want to update your “also by the author” lists in the earlier books). I also like that he creates HTML files rather than simply converting Word .doc files. I think you have more possibilities for customization that way, and, for non-fiction, in particular, that can be nice.

You can also check into Paul Salvette, an indie author based in Thailand. He’s been a guest poster here before. He wrote How to Format Your eBook for Kindle, NOOK, Smashwords, and Everything Else and just started BB eBooks, which offers formatting services.

Do you have anyone you’d recommend? Feel free to do so in the comments.

 



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