Going Indie and E Publishing

You may have noticed there are more books than ever available to buy electronically. This is because e publishing has exploded over the last few years, enabling anyone who has finished a book to publish it. There is much debate about whether this is a good thing or not, given the quality of some, but if you are interested in e publishing these are a few pointers to help you on your journey.

Platforms

If you want to e publish you need to get your book on both Amazon KDP and Smashwords. Between them they pretty much cover the whole range of book sellers. (I haven’t heard of the Amazon KDP Select program being worthwhile for anyone, so I’d recommend skipping that as it means you can’t sell elsewhere whilst your book is on it. Keep to the regular KDP.)

Formatting

You need to read the formatting guidelines and follow them (what you do for Smashwords is then fine for Amazon though, so you don’t need to do it twice). Get it wrong and your book won’t be accepted. It’s worth spending the time getting it right the first time. Some sites offer templates which make it a little easier, but do check your book over. A badly formatted book is a headache to read.

Covers