Support for Indie Authors discussion
Archived Author Help
>
Problems with formatting, Part 2
date
newest »
newest »
Hi Rachel, as a reader and reviewer I will not read a book that has too many errors in it. I find it too distracting. If I like the story I generally email the author to let them know. If it is a kindle ebook it is very common. Authors have to follow kindle instructions for formatting to the letter or they have problems, I have had to call Amazon because I wanted to know myself and to help the author. Again, that is if I thought the book is worth it. I only remember leaving a negative review once for a book for that reason and that would have been after trying to either contacting the author or the publisher without a response.
Is this eBook formatting issues?
I am quite busy with other book projects, but I can fix your eBook formatting. Once you do the changes, upload the fixed file, them email Amazon tech support advising them of what you fixed. They will then email all the ppl who bought your book that they can download a new, edited version. Then you do a social media campaign, letting them know that you have a second edition.
Best regards, Morris
I am quite busy with other book projects, but I can fix your eBook formatting. Once you do the changes, upload the fixed file, them email Amazon tech support advising them of what you fixed. They will then email all the ppl who bought your book that they can download a new, edited version. Then you do a social media campaign, letting them know that you have a second edition.
Best regards, Morris
Rachael wrote: "I've been having a bit of a roller coaster ride with my most recent book. There were formatting problems with the first page, which I fixed. I had concerns about issues later on in the sample but w..."When you check the file in the Kindle preview on KDP, do these formatting errors show up? Do you have a Kindle to download the preview file to and check the formatting? If those looked OK, then the person leaving the review got a corrupted download.
We always do the last proofing pass on our Kindle. That forces us to look at every page of the document, which catches any formatting errors as well as typos etc. Then we fix the errors, upload the corrected copy and check it again on both our Kindle and on-line previewer to make sure the corrections took, and nothing new cropped in. Only after we've done this to we release the book.
If you have specific questions about formatting issues that are persistent, feel free to PM me.
How do you contact Tech Support? I've tried messaging them on Twitter but haven't heard back. The "Contact Us" bit only seems to relate to returning faulty goods.
Rachael wrote: "How do you contact Tech Support? I've tried messaging them on Twitter but haven't heard back. The "Contact Us" bit only seems to relate to returning faulty goods."Log into your KDP dashboard (Bookshelf) and scroll down the page. At the bottom right, there is a "Contact Us" link. It takes you to a form where you can (optionally) select a category for your issue or just send them a free-form message.
Hi Owen, I'm going public in hopes of helping other people. How did you send your ebook to your Kindle before putting it up for sale.Also, Have you used Createspace, and if so, what do you consider the level of difficulty to be?
Thank you very much, Sue
Update: I received an email from Amazon yesterday asking for exact locations etc. Plain goofs - time of year, character descriptions I've amended etc - I've left. I'll only ask them to alter the places where it spoils the reading experience.
Just to add my few cents' worth of opinion, feel free to ignore it. I tried to do what you did at first, formatting my own book myself, but I found out that it was far too daunting for me. I mean, I want to write a book, not format my way to rage.So I took the shortcut by having draft2digital format it for me. It doesn't look exactly like what I would have wanted (they pushed a 364 page book into 280 by eliminating the space between the paragraphs), but it gets the job done without much worry on my part. They even did my copyright page for me.
So it's not perfect, but I don't want to spend too much time learning about how to format an ebook and having to retry it many times. It hurts my inspiration.
Sue wrote: "Hi Owen, I'm going public in hopes of helping other people. How did you send your ebook to your Kindle before putting it up for sale..."There are 2 ways, both assume you have the book formatted into a Kindle readable format (mobi or pdf most likely):
1) Email it to your Kindle email address (see http://www.amazon.com/gp/sendtokindle...)
--or--
2) Transfer the book from computer to Kindle via USB (see http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/custome... ... although I've never done steps 1-3 in that link. I have no clue what they're talking about there, I start at step 4 and have had it work fine.)
Further update: Amazon has emailed me to say that they'll review my book and if they decide major changes are needed, they'll temporarily remove it from sale. They'll let me know their decision on February 9th.Can't help feeling as though I've made a colossal mistake. At the risk of over sharing, this past month has been hell. I don't know how I'll cope if they take it off altogether.
Sue wrote: "Hi Owen, I'm going public in hopes of helping other people. How did you send your ebook to your Kindle before putting it up for sale.Also, Have you used Createspace, and if so, what do you consid..."
Micah covered this. I will just note (since it may not be obvious): to get a mobi file of your book at any time (before publishing or after), go to your KDP Bookshelf, click the Edit Details link for the book. On the Edit Details page at the bottom there is a link: Download Book Preview File. Once you download it, you can email it or transfer via USB as Micah said.
To answer you other question: yes, I have and I consider it to be quite easy. As far as creating a PDF file to upload to Createspace, that depends on the word processor being used, and there are some good threads on that here on SIA.
Hi Owen,Thank you very much for your explanations. I'm quite intimidated by computer technology.
Nearly a fortnight and a few hundred free copies later, I've received my first text review. (My only other one was a five star rating on this site). It's one star and gives the formatting as the primary reason - apparently they found it so frustrating, they abandoned it after the third chapter.
The instant I read this, I uploaded it again, correcting any problems I came across. My worry is that there are still 500 or so copies out there with the duff formatting, and that this review will stop people from reading. I honestly don't know how this happened - might the file have become corrupted? I'd love to know what you think.