One of the great things about paid publishers is once the book is written, they take care of all the other things. The editing, formatting, cover art, ISBN numbers, etc, etc, etc. Being an independant author those things are done by me. I hire editors, cover artists, format my own novels according to what the site requires, book promo…the list goes on. Thankfully I have a great resource of willing authors to push me in the right direction to obtain the things I need to do all the tiny things you take for granted.
The PDF version of my stories, while easy to make, take more time than I thought. What was an easy step, just hit print, isn’t as easy as once thought. The page size isn’t what it should be and I’ve given myself a headache trying to get it sized right. You would think it wouldn’t be an issue but, it is. The html version is also giving me a fit. My word program adds in all this extra…stuff that I have to manually take out. What should be an easy thing is taking me more time than I think it should. Maybe I’m just being really daft about it all. It’s probably as easy as hitting a button and I’m making a mountain out of a mole hill. That would be the story of my life though. I can never take the easy route.
No one said writing was easy. Sure its fun and gives you a chance to play in worlds you can only imagine but all the tiny things one takes for granted can suck the joy and fun out of it. So, hats off to publishers who take the brunt of this process. I still think the author has the hardest part, writing an exceptional book, but once that is done, the real work begins. Which I should be doing now instead of whining about the process. 😉
No Lily, it isn’t just you lol. Thought we had it licked dropping one pdf maker, going another pdf route, and we’re on our 3rd version. I’d lose my mind without dil, I swear. you know I hate tech stuff. I’ve found a few great help things by typing in pdf file help- lol. I can’t even think about HTML yet sob. Knowing you’re tech savy and having some glitches already has me groaning. But I’m tired and in the middle of an edit with another epub, you know, thinking part of the brain is just fatigued so the stuff don’t compute the way it should.
I’m looking at it as a learning experience, and sooo glad i keep my own LULU books at Aircastle simple and easy to make/file wise. Think of it this way, you learn everything not to do, pull your hair out, on the first one. rofl. Should get better after that.
Have a good one. Dian aka (Eve Asbury/Gayle Eden)