Something a little different – rather than a post on the ancient world today, here is something on the modern technologies that can be used to support authorship.
I guess it is fairly common knowledge now that authors can completely bypass the traditional publishing route and put their own content up on Amazon and other online retailers directly. There are huge debates – some would say arguments – as to the merits of this process of universalisation. I don’t propose to go into these, except to say that I don’t think that selection by a major publishing house necessarily confers literary merit (just think of all those series of airport romances one encounters), nor that going your own way necessarily shows independence of spirit and dedication to a cause (after all, it is true that some indie books have not been edited as carefully as they might, and some are not very good).
Nor am I going to go into a step-by-step account as to how to set up your files to download and then use Amazon’s KindleGen. There are some great tutorials out there and the world does not really need another one.
What I am going to do is talk a bit about my experiences of using these tools. The basic principles are easy – you take the document from your favourite word processing package, export it to HTML, then feed it into KindleGen on your favourite computer, and out comes a nicely produced mobi file. If you really want to short-circuit the process, you just take your word-processing file and throw it as-is into Smashwords and let their software do the work for you. What can go wrong?
Well, as ever, it is the little touches that make some of the difference. Personally, coming from a programming development background, I want to be in control of the process as much as I can. So the Smashwords approach (“just give us the Word document and we’ll convert it”) fills me with unease, even if I can then review the finished product. I am very happy to accept that it has been an enormous benefit to a lot of people who do not have the time, energy, and training to use a geeky tool like KindleGen. Geeky it certainly is! There is almost nothing in the way of online help, and whilst it does indeed have a sound inner logic, my guess is that some people find the raw listing of errors and warnings a bit intimidating. This, however, is just up my street!
I also like the way KindleGen allows you to get more pedantic and proper about the process as you learn more. So personally I would always split off my text styles into a central css file, and put supporting image files in their own folder. I prefer keeping my definition file logically separate from my content files, and both of these separate from the table of contents. That makes good sense!
But it has to be said that it is still a slow process. I have been working on two projects – a short story entitled The Man in the Cistern, which is set in the same world as In a Milk and Honeyed Land, and my former PhD thesis Triumphal Accounts in Hebrew and Egyptian. Both of these will see the light of day before long… but both have raised interesting problems. There are some common things – just how much geeky metadata does one need? What about getting an ISBN number? Just how many of the optional fields do I really need, and where to they appear in the online listing? When I look at it using the Kindle Previewer does it show up how I would like? In passing, this is another essential app, and one that encourages you to think about multiple different target devices rather than just the one you happen to own!
The thesis has been much the harder, partly because it is substantially longer, but mainly because the content includes funny fonts (well, Hebrew and Egyptian among others), together with lots of tables and diagrams. I have learned that things that work just fine in a word processor really do not work on kindle without a lot of fussing. I do think the effort is worth it – after all, if you are going to self-publish then you are denying yourself the expertise (and the cost) of professional layout. So you have to put in the thought and time yourself. Diagrams that look pretty good in a word-processor document have a tendency to go really weird in HTML and hence in kindle format.
Do I think it’s worth it? Definitely yes, even though my initial guess as to how long it would take has had to be revised upward quite significantly. And yes, I would happily go through the process again… once these two projects are finished and uploaded. For that, continue to watch this space…
While you’re waiting, remember that In a Milk and Honeyed Land is already for sale in kindle as well as other ebook formats, soft-cover and hard-cover. Check out http://www.kephrath.com/WhereToBuy.aspx for details.