Kindle Select?
Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) has Kindle Select as a marketing ploy. The idea is that you give KDP exclusive Kindle rights to distribution for 90 days. In return, you get…
Pre-Orders, Yes or No?
Now that your book formatting is ready, Kindle Direct Publishing has more questions. Pre-Order lets you start stirring up excitement about your book. However, I have read that pre-orders do…
PDFs for KDP Print Books (A fly in the ointment.)
I used Draft2Digital (D2D) to create a pdf for Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). Because pdf files are "print-ready," Amazon can be sure your paper book looks the way you intended.…
Checking Your eBook For Amazon
Amazon sells Kindle devices and books to fill them. Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is the right arm of eBooks. Just as DOCX is the file type for Word, MOBI is…
Self-Publishing: Those Pesky ISBNs
For print books, Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) and Draft2Digital (D2D) will supply a free International Standard Book Number (ISBN) with the click of a button. The companies are not trying…
Self-Publishing 101 #3
Preparation for Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is different for eBooks and print books. KDP allows you to upload in several formats, but I found ePub to format well. Draft2Digital…
Self-Publication 101 #2
In preparing for Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), you need a clean file to upload. KDP allows .docx, HTML, epub and pdf. Uploading a .docx book works well, but I wanted…
Self-Publishing 101
An author’s first foray into Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) can be challenging. KDP is not impossible, and Amazon makes every effort to make it easy, but don’t kid yourself; it…
The Shortest Backstory
Backstory sends so many queries to the reject pile. One reason Prologs became unpopular was that they are often a backstory. Backstory is for the writer, not the reader. Our…
Transitions
Transitions are the glue that allows our WIP to move from scene to scene, week to week. We try to avoid “The next day,” “Later,” and other time markers. The…
Opening Pages and that First Line
I attended a small writer's workshop in Sacramento. One of the sessions included several agents. Participants submitted the first page of a work in progress. Chuck Sambuchino read the page…
Earworms and Writing Misquotes
Earworms can be annoying. I suffer from Musical Earworms and Word Earworms. Before I was married, my roommate was a piano tuner, and there was another tuner in the area…
Consolation Prize
I got a little plastic statue for second place at the Turkey Shoot at Rifle Club in high school. Yes, this was a different time. I hadn’t thought about it,…
Saturdays with “Sunday”
Time tends to slip away. Before I was married, I roomed with Jim Gaden. I met Jim in college and started taking piano lessons from him. On Saturdays, Jim fiddled…
Keyboards
I spend an inordinate amount of time at keyboards these days. I play the Steinway daily but have become displeased with its performance. It seems to make the same mistakes…