Hey Folks,
A little under the weather today. Nothing serious, just blah. Not sure how much writing I’ll get done, if any. Feels like a day of doing zip.
I added my most recent novel, a whodunit mystery, to the website. You can see it at http://harveystanbrough.com/the-implications/.
Topic: Ebook Editors (actually, formatting programs)
This stuff was going to go into “Of Interest” but it’s too important. Especially for those who are new to ebook publishing or thinking about ebook publishing.
If you fit either of those categories, or if you are frustrated with your current formatting process or software, here are a few articles I strongly recommend you read.
One: “How to Use Reedsy’s Book Editor to Format Ebooks and Print for Free” at https://selfpublishingadvice.org/how-to-use-reedsys-book-editor-to-format-ebooks-and-print/.
I’m not wild about the “‘for’ free” appelation, but the article itself is pretty good. I won’t be using Reedsy myself because
1. It’s browser based. There’s no program to download and I’m more of a want-it-on-my-computer kind of guy.
2. I’m happy with MS Word for my formatting. But I’ve been at it a long while so it’s easy-peasy.
Two: In light of my second note above, here’s a link to my free “The Essentials of Digital Publishing,” which explains in detail how to format your Word .doc for submission to Draft2Digital, Smashwords, et al (who then convert your .doc to .epub, .mobi and .pdf): http://harveystanbrough.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/DPubV2X.pdf/. I sold a bunch of copies for $10, and this is free. Just sayin’.
Three: For another article on using MS Word as a formatting platform, see “Book Production Advice: How to Format an Ebook using Microsoft Word” at https://selfpublishingadvice.org/book-production-advice-how-to-format-an-ebook-using-microsoft-word/. I’ve read it. It’s pretty good, but only for formatting ebooks.
Four: If you’re a Mac user, I recommend Vellum as I’ve heard nothing but great things about it. It’s not available for PCs, but you can read “Production: Vellum as a Formatting Tool for Print” at https://selfpublishingadvice.org/vellum-for-print/.
Five: Finally, if you’d like a simple but thorough guide into the ins and outs of Microsoft Word, check out my free blog series “Microsoft Word for Writers” at http://harveystanbrough.com/microsoft-word-for-writers/. Nothing I hate worse than receiving a manuscript for editing and seeing that the writer still used the Tab bar or the space bar to indent the first line of paragraphs. Ugh.
Today, and Writing
Rolled out way early again. Not sure why, and I didn’t feel well. I thought I might start another story, but if I wrote something today it would be just to put words on a page. So calling today a non-writing day.
Went to the grocery and the post office, did a load of laundry, read a little, watched some TV. Stuff like that.
Back tomorrow.
Of Interest
See the stuff in the Topic above.
Via The Passive Voice, see “Note to All Creatives: Marketing is Your Job” at https://medium.com/the-mission/note-to-all-creatives-marketing-is-your-job-6c4adecc38bf/.
Also, an article about one part of the decline of humanity (in my opinion). Like cursive writing, doing math without calculators, and dictionaries beginning to insist that “imply” and “infer” are interchangeable, there inevitably comes a time when it’s easier to change the technology than to teach skills to those who use it. See “The End of Typing: The Internet’s Next Billion Users Want Video and Voice” at https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-end-of-typing-the-internets-next-billion-users-will-use-video-and-voice-1502116070/.
Fiction Words: XXXX
Nonfiction Words: 500 (Journal)
So total words for the day: 500
Writing of “” ()
Day 1…… XXXX words. Total words to date…… XXXXX
Total fiction words for the month……… 13581
Total fiction words for the year………… 376559
Total nonfiction words for the month… 3050
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 122160
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 498719
The Daily Journal blog streak……………………………………… 620 days
Calendar Year 2017 Novel Goal (15 novels or novellas)………………… 8 novels or novellas
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)………………………………………… 26
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)……………………………………… 4
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……………………………… 179