RSSHow to Kindle Convert Your Book (10 Helpful Hints)
Mar 22
A Writer's Blog, Life in Digital Comments Off
Electronic delivery of books is rapidly becoming a more mainstream option for writers to distribute their titles. Although there are competing digital formats for books, if your time and resources are limited, producing a kindle version (for amazon) is a safe bet to start with.
There is some design work involved to convert your title and it requires that you understand html code. There’s no doubt that amazon will continue to find ways to streamline the process but right now, there are some cumbersome issues with kindle conversion. One, there’s no actual step-by-step instructions (there is a starter guide but all it really tells you is check to the FAQ for formatting hints). Two, there is a real lack of organization within the FAQ for specific tasks, like creating an chapter index. Three, if you don’t know html, you face an uphill battle.
The rest of this article is focused on hints to successfully convert your title to an html format for upload to kindle. Note however, this is not an extensive lesson in how to program within html. There are entire websites devoted to teaching html.
1) You need the html file first
If you have a .pdf copy of your complete book, you can use the Export As feature in Adobe Acrobat to save it as an html file. You do not want html with css because the essential process from this point on is to take the html file and strip it of virtually all formatting.
2) You can preview your html file in a web browser
You can check the basic look of your html file by opening the file within a web browser. Every time you edit and save your html file, you can refresh the browser page and see how it looks. Note however that the kindle conversion assumes certain formatting options so it won’t look exactly the same after you upload it to amazon. However, previewing is a sound way to spot design problems within your html file.
3) Edit your file in Notepad or Wordpad
Right click on the file icon and open your html file in Notepad or Wordpad. This is the simplest way to make changes to your file.
4) Beware how conversion can run amok in your file
If you convert from an Adobe pdf file, you need to be aware how it presumes html formatting within the code that creates more problems than it solves. The good news is that it tends to correctly format bold and italics from your book so those likely won’t need any correcting. The bad news is that when you open the file, it can look like a scary mess, filled with incorrectly placed html commands and more commands than you would ever need.
Take a minute to see what’s really there. Look for html commands. They are always written within square brackets. < >
Remember, within html files, extra spaces are ignored.
Also, specialty characters begin with &. So you might see something that looks like garbage but isn’t a mistake. Being able to read the code is essential, so learn html or bring someone on board who knows how to program in html.
5) It pays to look at an example of a kindle book
Don’t own a kindle? The amazon-kindle site has some examples for you to preview (in notepad or in a web browser). You might also benefit from previewing a live book. Remember, kindle doesn’t honor your print versions’ page breaks. That’s right, it has its own formula for where to break to the next page. That means your page numbers may be in the way.
6) For the most part, your objective is to strip away as much html code as possible
That’s right, you want the simplest file possible. Kindle will presume certain formatting options and why not let it? (Technically, you can code around kindle’s assumptions if you know advanced html). That way, you aren’t challenging kindle reader’s expectations of the digital edition with complicated formatting.
7) DRM -- digital rights management
Do not enable it when setting up your kindle file. Would you sell a copy to your customer and then ask them not to loan the book out to a friend? No, you wouldn’t. So why would you do it for an electronic format? If you enable DRM, you prevent your customer from sharing it.
8 ) ISBN -- international standard book number
An ISBN is not required for kindle editions. If your book has a physical edition, you can use the same ISBN number.
9) Chapter index or table of contents
In order to dynamically create a chapter index, you need to understand anchors and html links. This is advanced html so you need to determine how essential a chapter index is to your final product. If you don’t need a dynamic index, you are saving yourself a lot of programming work.
10) How to add images
The one trick about image links is to use relative links. An absolute link looks like this:
http://smartremarx.com/1922/indie-writerss-new-world-order/
A relative link looks like this:
/1922/indie-writerss-new-world-order/
and the directory information of the image is assumed. If you use absolute links, your image may go missing.
There may have been a time, even a year ago, when the effort to create a kindle edition was more work than reward. That paradigm has shifted and now we live in world that fully embraces digital books.
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Andrew Marx is a long time writer on SmartReMarxcom and recently published a new work of fiction Accidents Happen. You can contact him on twitter or leave a comment below.
