Marketing - to Publishers Electronic Press Formatting

17 October 2011, Marketing - to Publishers Electronic Press Formatting

Introduction: I realized that I need to introduce this blog a little.  I wrote the novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon.  The working title was Daemon, and this was my 21st novel.  Over the last year, I gave you the entire novel in installments that included commentary on the writing.  In the commentary, in addition to other general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the way I built the scenes.  You can look back through this blog and read the entire novel.

I'm using this novel as an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel published.  I'll keep you informed along the way.  At this moment, I'm showing you the marketing material I put together for a novel.

Today's Blog:  In the case of self published works, the rule about formatting a book changes.  Usually, you never want to format a book prior to publication like a final book.  For a work you self publish, you must make the work look as much as possible like the final book.  You have to add in all the special pages, copyright page, introductions, lexicons, thanks, dedications, etc., etc.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, look at an example of any modern published book.  You want to design your own dingbats and put them in.  If you don't know what a dingbat is or how it is used, keep reading this blog.  I'll get to it eventually.

You can easily put in black and white pictures and potentially color pictures in electronic books.  You need to be careful with that too.  If you haven't noticed the many self published works filled with horrible amateur art work, you just aren't looking.  I'll say it again, if you self publish, your book must look exactly like a finished professionally published work.  I'll also repeat this warning--by self publishing, you may be crippling yourself as an author and a writer, but that's enough said on that subject.
More tomorrow about formatting electronically published books.

I'll repeat my published novel websites so you can see more examples:   http://www.ldalford.com/, and the individual novel websites:  http://www.aegyptnovel.com/, http://www.centurionnovel.com/, http://www.thesecondmission.com/, http://www.theendofhonor.com/, http://www.thefoxshonor.com/, and http://www.aseasonofhonor.com/.