Publish Your Book On The Amazon Kindle: A Practical Guide [Paperback]

Michael R. Hicks (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 14, 2008

If you're an author or independent publisher who wants to make your book available to the rapidly growing number of Amazon Kindle users, this book is for you! This book will lead you step-by-step through the process of taking your book from an original digital file, such as a word processor document, to the Kindle Store catalog. It will help you understand the unique paradigm of the Kindle's reflowable text format, and provide solutions to the major problems people commonly face. You'll also learn the two main paths of publishing to the Kindle Store, plus how to maximize the return on your effort by also publishing your work to Mobipocket.com. The book assumes that you have NO working knowledge of HTML code. You'll be introduced to certain aspects of HTML that will help you format your book, but it's presented in an easy-to-follow format that focuses on the specific things you need to know to get the job done!

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

A lifelong fan of science fiction and a self-proclaimed geek, Michael R. Hicks spends most of his waking hours working or playing on computers and other gadgets, like his tricked-out Kindle and iPhone. Involved in designing a variety of web sites since the early 1990s, he has extensive experience with HTML and a wide variety of computer applications. When his first novel, an epic fantasy called In Her Name, was ready for publication in early 2008, he decided to go the self-publishing route as a learning experience and personal challenge. During the course of getting In Her Name published, he learned how to prepare and publish books on Lulu.com, CreateSpace, Lightning Source, Mobipocket, and Amazon's Digital Text Platform (DTP). Since then, he spends a lot of time on the Amazon DTP and Mobipocket forums, helping other authors and small-press publishers get their books onto the Kindle and Mobipocket. His other pursuits including working out with his friends at the Beachbody.com community, bicycling, kayaking, and - of course - reading on his Amazon Kindle. He lives in Maryland with his gorgeous wife, two awesome stepsons, and two rambunctious Siberian cats, enjoying the chaos as he works on his next novel.

Product Details

• Paperback: 68 pages
• Publisher: CreateSpace (November 14, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1440456941
• ISBN-13: 978-1440456947
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 8.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #543,999 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born in 1963, Michael Hicks grew up in the age of the Apollo program and spent his youth glued to the television watching the original Star Trek series and other science fiction movies, which continue to be a source of entertainment and inspiration. Having spent the majority of his life as a voracious reader, he has been heavily influenced by writers ranging from Robert Heinlein to Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven, and David Weber to S.M. Stirling. Living in Maryland with his beautiful wife, two wonderful stepsons and two mischievous Siberian cats, he continues to work full-time while dreaming and writing.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Packed with info! A must read!, September 14, 2009

By 

Allan H. Goodman "solomonpublications" (Rockville, MD USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Publish Your Book On The Amazon Kindle: A Practical Guide (Paperback)

Well done! This book is terrific. It is not just about creating an Amazon Kindle book, but tells you the best way to create an ebook for sale on Amazon and other websites as well. Michael's advice on using the mobipocket creator software to create a prc (kindle compatible) file rather than simply uploading an html file to the Amazon DTP is right on. This method gives you more options to sell your books on other websites - not just Amazon. He walks you through the mobipocket software with ease. Also, the information about selling your books to other websites through mobipocket is well written and makes a complicated subject easy to understand. For those of you who like to do it yourself, alot of help from those who have already done it makes it easy.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars very good basic guide, August 28, 2009

By 

Isaiah R. Tucker "New Kindle DX owner :)" (Yucca, Arizona USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Publish Your Book On The Amazon Kindle: A Practical Guide (Kindle Edition)

Michael R. Hicks does a very good job of guiding a beginner through the file conversion process. Especially helpful was the basic HTML coverage. Before this, I knew nothing about HTML except that it was a type of format favored by websites. Now I can go into my ebook and make changes to the layout with this useful tool. I do wish he would have gone a little deeper into the subject instead of referring us to outside sources, but he got me started in the right direction.

Two things I discovered while converting my first book (which I hope to be uploading to Amazon soon) with MobiPocket Creator:

The very useful HTML command <br/> which inserts a space between two lines of text when you absolutely have to have it and the Creator ignores the normal paragraph space.

This was a big issue for me because I use Word 2007: MP Creator does not currently accept MS Office Word 2007 format (.docx) so you need to save your book as a Word 2003 (.doc) OR which I reccommend because I had to do MUCH less tweaking afterword, save your file as a WEBPAGE (FILTERED). This converts the file to HTML right in MS Word (so when searching for it from MP Creator browse for HTML files instead of Word files.) I had much less trouble getting the book layout the way I wanted it this way.

I hope Michael will address these issues in upcoming editions, making his great guide even better.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars June Nolen author of In Reverse Time, November 13, 2009

By 

June Nolen "June Nolen author of In Reverse T... (southeast) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Publish Your Book On The Amazon Kindle: A Practical Guide (Paperback)

I just published my book to Amazon Kindle. I purchased this book by Michael Hicks because I had no idea where to start. I didn't even know what an HTML file looked like. Especially helpful to me was his information on creating the cover picture and the DTP forums. He takes you through the process, step by step, on how to create an eBook.
Although Mobipocket isn't taking new authors at this time, the information on the Mobipocket Creator was of great help.
I had many questions and had to get a lot of help. The forums were always there and if I didn't find an answer there, I could ask a question and get one. With the help of Michael Hicks, and the information in this book, I finally made it to Kindle. Thanks Mike! Cheers!