Tomas’s Comments (group member since May 15, 2018)

Tomas’s comments from the Support for Indie Authors group.

Just now as I'm preparing to release my debut, I've been giving an ARC to my betas and some of my gamer friends who supported me. One of the declined, saying she'll rather buy it to support me - which gave me quite the mixed feelings: on one hand, it shows she trusts my skills, on the other, it feels weird (maybe even wrong) to take money from friends, even if it's just $3.
Am I just overthinking this...?

I don't know if I am the only one with this issue, but I am really afraid to talk to my family about the fact I write. So far, only two of my relatives know (my sister, who I told two years in, and my mother, who I told 4y8m in). Mostly because I'm not sure I'd be able to put in a way that wouldn't lead to unrealistic expectations (which I fear way more than any form of disapproval).

Which is why having someone to talk to, someone who is also a writer, is so important - they know the specifics of such a hobby with both the good and the bad parts.

Phillip wrote: "What sucks about this topic is when I need a pick me up/pep talk."

I can see that - as someone who has kept my writing a secret for a long time (and still does, to some degree), not having anyone to talk with about this sucks a lot.
In this, I guess the best case scenario would be some long-distance friendship with some of your betas to share your burdens.

Just my theory but I'd say people who are e-readers and browse the Kindle Store are in a buying mood more likely than anyone else, more so if they browse from their kindle and want to read, like, right now. Not to mention that $3 Kindle e-book is way closer to the 'buy on impulse' territory than $10 paperback.

That's something you're unlikely to replicate as well with paperbacks. Plus, for books distributed via print-on-demand (most self-pub authors, I guess), there may be wait time. And if they're about to bundle a few books (into one package to save on postage), they may check extra for books that'd be ready at the same time. Or maybe different dimensions.

This is a hard topic. I rarely speak about my writing with other people, and if I do, it's mostly a cryptic mention that I'm doing something, and I never offer anything - unless they'd ask.
Then, maybe the thing is that I live in a country that doesn't speak English while writing in English myself, which walls a lot of people off right on the start...

Hello, everyone.

Just curious: is there anyone who used either Kindle Create or Calibre to create a print-ready PDF of your book, and can you share your experience (and, possibly, some tips)?

Gail wrote: "...was really surprising to me, too, being a WEEKEND!"

Exactly! I'd be expecting most self-pun authors will upload during the weekend (because they have jobs during the workdays) and thus that it'll be worse than rush hour traffic.

I'm wondering how long do the usual processes take for KDP and Goodreads, respectively, because I was pleasantly surprised how fast it was for me today.

I started filling the forms for creating KDP account around 11:00 CEST, which took little time. I believe I uploaded the book around 12:00. The book was processed quite fast, listed mere 3 hours later and, 5 hours later, pre-orders were enabled. The estimate is 'up to 72 hours'.
On Sunday, of all things.

As soon as the book was listed (even though pre-orders not yet enabled), I filled in the request for Goodreads author account. This took ~2 hours (again, on a Sunday). The estimate here? Up to 5 days.

And, finally, enabling Kindle X-ray took... 10 minutes, I think? Sure, setting up the glossary will take a while, but there's some background processing that needs to run first.

It feels quite fast, especially as I would expect anyone with a slightly-spooky book uploading right now so it's for sure up before Halloween.
Is all of this so smooth most of the time and the 72hrs/5days is worst case scenario, or was I extremely lucky?

B.A. wrote: "He did mean going to the store. That is how you get to the niche categories that aren't in the choices you get when in KDP. These niche categorie yoy need to get support to put your books in them. Wrtie down each sub category so they have tge string."

Sorry for the mistake.

Also, a question of my own: there's another filter below those, 'refine search by'.
In case of fantasy, there's 'Genre' (I guess this is for secondary elements) and 'Creatures' (demons, angels, fae, ...)
Any idea how to set up those? Is that auto-done by tags/keywords?

Also, on the matter of Calibre... epub converts into reflowable text while AZW3 and MOBI don't seem so, at least in the previewer.

Mark wrote: "When you say browse the store, are you talking about the KPD list of categories when publishing your book? Or - do you mean the Amazon store when searching for a book? Thanks !"

Those should be the same.

Also, for those who use Calibre to create the e-book file and then upload it to Amazon, will Amazon auto-adjust the text to automatic indentation?

Reviving this topic: anyone around who has a basic understanding of Xpath syntax? I'm trying to force the book to open at Prologue (skipping ToC and front matter) but trial and error don't work for me so far and neither does the explanation on W3schools.

The simple list would be to browse the store down level by level and see what it offers you. For example, if you go to Kindle e-books -> Science fiction and Fantasy -> Fantasy, you'll see around 25 categories (such as Epic Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, ...). These are the lowest level categories, which you want to use.

Mark wrote: "In the KDP category list, (where you get to select two), can you use different categories for your eBook and Paperback, for a total of four and does this help you? "

You can get up to 10 categories by contacting support and giving them a list of categories you want to add. This can be done either by e-mail or by phone.
Be aware that you need the FULL category path.

I've found my cover artist on Fiverr, and it cost me ~300€, but that was fantasy, not historical romance... no idea how much the genre affects it.

There are some issues reported that deal with links from Facebook to Amazon. Supposedly, the issue is the strongest on Amazon UK.

Not sure if it's related to the issue you're facing but if you have FB ads booked to boost your promo, keep an eye out.

Goodreads, specifically, wants to keep obsolete editions in the database - if thy deleted an edition, how would they approach people who had that edition marked as read? Swap to a random different edition? To the default edition? What if they had more editions read and reviewed more of them, that could cause conflict as well.

They won't add a new category this way, so you need to use an existing 'string'. Some sources also say it needs to start with the real top category (in our case, Kindle ebooks), not just the genre.
Keywords, however, may be the way to this.

Also, to Mark: you can be in 10 categories total, so if you're not at that cap, just ask the support to add whatever you've found as the next one. As far as I know, Amazon still allows picking only two categories at upload despite allowing 10 per book.

Also, when it comes to keywords, don't waste them on using words that are already in the categories, and don't use the title, series, or your name either - it's a waste, the search takes those into account already.

Links are not allowed in this group, so remove the link before your post is removed.

On topic: I've heard about it, but I'm not sure how useful it might be. After all, you should choose categories based on what category your book is, or you risk attracting wrong readers and screwing the recommendations attached to your book. A very similar genre might be okay, but the further you go, the greater the risk.