Exciting times. My international thriller Dark Market has been chosen by the USA Network for it’s reading list to run alongside their new series DIG this fall (that’s autumn for my UK readers). Here’s the cover with it’s cool new sticker. More on the when, where, and how in the coming weeks along with how to get it in paperback at long last!
You can watch the teaser for the new series right here, check it out below:
by 
Scrivener can format to epub, Kindle Mobi files and Word docs ready for print-on-demand. Albeit in plain format, and for the bulk of writers that’s probably more than enough. So, let’s get you where you want to be in double-quick time. Step 1: Open Scrivener, enter your title (in this case Dark Market test) and you will see this: 
Step 2: Select ‘Draft’ in the left hand file menu: 
Step 3: Right click the brown corkboard screen select Add→New Text. You can also use ctrl+n. These will be your chapters. Add a bunch of them, say 10 or 12 to test how this is going to work. It should look like this: 
Step 4: Now title each of the text boxes, either by selecting each box on the corkboard or right-clicking each file in the left hand menu. These names will populate the Table of Contents (automatic), once you add your text. 
Now add some text (I’ll do a full text-import tutorial later on). For now simply copy a chapter from your Word/Open Office application. Then select the relevant section in the left hand menu and paste it onto the blank page. Include a chapter heading as we’ll be maintaining those by hand. It should look like this: 
Step 5: If you want section breaks, say your story is broken down into the days of the week, or you want to indicate a change of location or time as I do here, then simply add a new text to the corkboard and drag it on top of the section before your break (see the left hand file menu above, look for Three Years Later). It will then appear as a secondary item to that text file. If you don’t need section breaks just skip this step. Step 6: Hit the compile button: 
and select or deselect all the items you want to appear in your book’s Table of Contents. In the example below I’ve kept all the headings from the text boxes except Three Years Later because it’s simply a section break and not a chapter heading: 
Step 7: Now, staying in the Compile section select Formatting and you’ll see this: 
If you check each box exactly as you see above the ToC will source from the titles of your text areas that you labelled in Step 4. You can then either type in your titles by hand (add images) at the top of each text area, or copy and paste them from your original – and style them as you wish. Step 8: Still in Compile select Separators and make as follows. 
Step 9: Add your metadata. Name your document and add your metadata – book title, author name, publisher, etc. in the pop-up window pictured below: 
Step 10: Make sure you’ve selected your file format (bottom right of the Compile screen), that’s the “Kindle(Mobi) Book (.mobi)” selection above, for epubs you’ll need to add a cover in the Compile section as well. For Kindle you upload the cover with your book, make sure it’s 2500 pixels on it’s longest side. Hit compile. You’re done, proof your final document in the reader of your choice and it’s time to upload to your publishing platform in either epub, mobi or Word doc. If you want to format in more detail, or add CSS stylesheets to format your book in something other than Scrivener’s plain old vanilla, then save it as an epub and edit in the free Sigil program. That’s it, any questions add a comment below, or if this speeds up your workflow then show some love and buy a book! One of mine obviously.
by
Agent's Manifesto - Jonny Geller - Curtis Brown
I applaud Jonny Geller of Curtis Brown for trying to up his game in the new world of publishing, here’s the original article. What follows are my own individual writer responses to Jonny’s manifesto in a Q&A format:
The Agent’s Manifesto
JG: It feels like a perfect storm is brewing; publishers battening down the hatches, retailers at war with one another, e-tailers deactivating “buy” buttons as if it’s a game of Call of Duty.
One person has been forgotten in this unholy maelstrom: the author. Remember, we don’t have a job without him or her. For those of us still working in the legacy business of publishing books, here’s a reminder of the primary mover in this chain—an Agent’s Manifesto, as it were, to All Those in the Business of Publishing Books on Behalf of the Author:
» The author is the expert. Why assume that the one person who has spent the past 12-18 months on the subject, the story and the world of their work, knows least about how they should be represented to the trade and to the reader?
FC: Good point. Some times however writers don’t know it all, or anything. But then sure as hell-fire neither do publishers. Expect respect all round or expect a bitch-slap.
JG: The author is not an object which a publisher has to step over in order to achieve a successful publication. If they have a problem with the cover, blurb, copy or format, then something isn’t right.
FC: No argument here. Add in copyediting and proofing too and I’m 100%.
JG: The author loves bookshops. Bookshops need to learn how to love authors again. We need to bring them back together.
FC: Book shops – or I imagine Jonny is referring to book chains – are like most large companies: slow to respond, filled with bureaucracy and the last in-line for new ideas. But it’s a good point that with the chains there is no dialogue between writer and end sales point. It’s more normally a sales relationship between publishing conglomerate and chain.
JG: We publishing professionals are the ones who bear the risk—agents with time; publishers with investment; retailers with space. Authors risk only their whole life, self-esteem and their babies.
FC: Absolutely! 9-to-5ers often simply do not get that writing is a business, if you don’t pay on time or fudge your accounts, you will force writers (your suppliers) out of business. We do take it personally when you rip us off, plagiarize our formats, or enforce the often fraudulent practice of reserves against returns, along with criminally lengthy ‘accounting’ periods, laughable royalty rates, unenforceable contracts, creeping all-rights clauses and similar petty practices.
JG: Publishers need to understand that “Author Care” is not a euphemism for “Care in the Community”. Authors who are valued, understood, appreciated, included, nurtured and spoken to like an adult will experience a phenomenon called Trust. Trust breeds loyalty; loyalty means longevity; longevity means sales.
FC: In a good business relationship – as in personal relationships. All sides should ideally feel their needs are met. A lot of authors might feel that the ‘Publisher care’ they’re expected to provide is simply the “bend over and spread ’em!” practices we’ve come to know and loathe. In my experience all this could be avoided by frank, honest, and above all accountable communication from the outset.
JG: Authors will endeavor to understand better what a publisher does—e-books are not created after two minutes of scanning and ticking a series of boxes on Amazon’s self-publishing program.
FC: Tragically we do try to understand what a publisher does, constantly, all the time. Sadly, what often becomes apparent is that some publishers don’t know what they are doing in the first place. And nobody takes responsibility for what they do. We will however continue to try to understand what publishers do as this is a part of our business.
In return publishers should ideally endeavor to understand what an author/writer does and to factor their (author’s) business costs into advances. A license to publish is effectively a venture capital agreement in purpose not subsidy publishing on the author’s part. Written words/manuscripts can be changed with out the usual dramas, e-books can be created within a short time frame, as little as 2-8 hours. E-books can be formatted to suit readers, not designers. Indie published authors are often way ahead of the game on this. For some indie ebooks, yes, there is poor formatting, granted, but equally from trad -publishing there is a severe amount of over-formatting and nearly all the same poor formatting errors indies make too.
When it comes to formatting never forget ebooks are reader-defined platforms. It’s their reading experience that counts. That applies to everyone.
JG goes on to say:
Authors need publishers; they need experts to guide and protect them.
FC: What writers need are respectful, professional, business partners. We don’t actually need publishers or agents to become writers, or to negotiate contracts, only to get in to the large book chains and find out which commissioning editors have any money left.
So, in summary, respect to Jonny for throwing down a gauntlet from the inside to say let’s buck up our ideas. Let’s see if anyone is actually listening to authors or to Jonny.
That’s my two ha’pennies. Thanks for listening.
Who is this bloke anyway? Frank Coles is one of those writer upstarts, who respectfully begs your leave to go back to his pit and flagellate himself at the typewriter for scraps of offal once again.
NOT!
by
If you want to unfreeze your Kindle or restore the factory defaults, do the following:
1. Hold the power switch to the right for 20 seconds.
2. Press the HOME button for 1 minute. Eventually you will see the screen to your right.
3. Nine times out of ten just hitting the DEL button at this point will unfreeze your machine without having to lose all your files (please note, you can replace them later but it takes time and you will lose your notes, bookmarks, and settings).
4. If that doesn’t work you will have to restore the factory default settings by typing in R E S E T. As soon as you hit the T it will reset.
That’s it. Please note that this is for the Kindle 3G + wifi 6 inch version.
by
Writer, Entrepreneur, Speaker, Father.
Recent Comments