![]() It has been awhile since I have written. A few new learning hurtles to get over...and realizations to make! Recently everyone has been going on about how great self publishing is. And don't get me wrong, it is an option, and a good one, however like in my recent experience of young people getting their training to teach English over seas, the thing is, it isn't about just the travel, YOU ACTUALLY HAVE TO TEACH. If you don't like children or the school system or having to mark papers or manage children, well, it may be a great way to get there, but it is still part of the package. The same can be true of self publishing. I spent DAYS working with Word 2016 and I tell you, IT WAS NO EASY PROCESS! I looked at You tube videos, however most were older versions of word and in the new Word it may be more sleek looking, but the price you pay for this, is buttons moved (or removed!), steps replaced with more non-intuitive ones and just generally a pain in the ass program if you want it for the nitty gritty, After in the word self publish, there is the word SELF! The biggest thing I learned about formatting a book, is TO START WITH THE BIGGER PICTURE. Get the pages you want, and the order they need to be in, FIRST before you start editing. (look at books!). Then deal with the page breaks..( section breaks are NOT the same as page breaks!) and remember there is a button to LINK page numbers or NOT to link page numbers! When you start dealing with page numbers and author or title names in the headers and footers, being able to unlink to pages that you don't want these on, as well as section breaks is important! Just like section breaks are important if you don't want anything on the first page of each chapter! The basic template in Createspace has page numbers at the bottom...but many books have the page number next to the author (even pages) and title (odd pages) which is what I wanted, and the first page of each chapter , have the number at the bottom. I got it but it took a while to figure out! Look for the three little boxes and make sure you check or uncheck them as needed...what boxes? Even and odd and also the one different first page. The bottom one is on linked or not. Oh yes, there is a page break button in one place however to do section breaks I believe it is layout you need to go to. Top of a list of three in the middle of the bar list. And always use the edit buttons! If your working with styles, and you want it set up for the next book, do everything the same way and edit with the edit buttons in pages or headers for instance, even inserting a picture...this way, when you go to make a PDF, it will not go nuts on you! So once again, I learned a few things the hard way. For instance, did you know that if you create a style in word, rather than modify an existing style, often it will revert back to the original if you copy and paste the file. Or that it may just randomly do it anyhow? Or that you have to be VERY careful with the difference between page breaks and section page breaks. And whatever you do, make sure if you replace a page break with a SECTION page break, you are sure to take the old one out! I learned these things after days of things moving around, reverting, and just generally following no predictable pattern at all. After doing more research, it wasn't just me, Word is very glitchy and doesn't stay consistent for long if there is even one error in how you use it! I also learned, after watching a ton of videos, that there is a million different ideas out there on what size a margin should be and a header from the top of the page, even the size; is it 6.25 or is it 6 in and 6 x 9 book? Word doesn't allow for bleeds however now, Createspace has a size of a little above 6 x 9 to accommodate this rumour which is likely correct. Oh yes, everyone on You Tube shows your as if they are an expert! Make up your own decisions and don't assume anything on You Tube is accurate! Then there is the whole legal issues of Fonts...what is free and what is REALLY free. Free for personal use is NOT the same as free for Commercial use! Good to know. I suspect most fonts on Createspace are purchased for use, so I MAY BE WRONG, but if it is on Createspace's templates, it likely is legally safe to use it. There is also a good chance if you have Word and Photoshop than you legally have use of their fonts, but again, for commercial use, not so sure. I hunted around, did the research and found a few places where you can BUY fonts or get free ones good for commercial use...I hope. Did my best, and the odds of anyone being picky are small, but who knows? Better safe than sorry. These days ignorance is NOT bliss! Lastly fonts...what is the correct font to use? So first, what is serif mean and what does sans-serif mean? Well think of old and fancy...with more added but the name is smaller! Here is an image... Serf is what is considered the best for text on paper, while sans serif is considered the best on screen. Common and old stand by fonts for text in a book is Garamond, and Times New Roman. The new font that is considered modified and good for both on screen and off is Georgia. Of course there are zillion of other fonts out there. Look at books, and decide for yourself. As a self publisher you get to decide how your book looks. That is one of the perks! I put my dedication at the END of my book and my disclaimer on the FIRST PAGE! My choice. So what about using real names of locations or a food chain, how does that work? Tricky! And of course, everyone will tell you different things, SO GO TO A PROFESSIONAL. Don't believe everything you hear! If you are not saying anything BAD about the place, then fine, otherwise, be careful. Don't forget the disclaimer anyhow no matter what. I also realized when I made a copy of what I did, many of my modified styles started to revert however if you click on modify, and see it is what you set it to, and close again, it will probably re-apply...otherwise do the modify again. I am taking screen shots of all my modifies to make sure I have them for the next book! The other thing is if you are old school, and type and leave two spaces. Now it is only one. So just use the search and replace . type into the find by hitting the space bar twice and in the replace, hit the space bar once and then hit, replace .... make sure it works before doing the rest! And getting rid of paragraphs...oh la la! What a pain in the ass that was! Found it though. I googled in every way, shape and form, finally while just playing around with it, I found it. Use FIND AND REPLACE. In the find space you need to put in a paragraph mark (go to advanced or whatever it is in the find and place sectional box...click til you find the drop down for special marks I think it is called)...select the paragraph mark THEN HIT THE SPACE BAR and add another paragraph mark...>...one of these is in it...anyhow, in the replace, just put in the paragraph mark again. If you don't hit the space bar in the find section, you will loose your indent and everything will run together. I did a style modification before hand to get the indent. I learned all sorts of little things like this. It was really not easy. So much has been removed from Word, as I said, nothing user friendly about it. I was reading it is said folks only use a little of Word, and no wonder why. So not intuitive at all. It was obviously modified by folks who already knew how to use it so loosing a command here or there, wasn't a big deal, but they made a real boo boo with so many folks going into writing their own books and self publishing them. Oh yes, if you use the latest version of you pdf to edit, make sure you put the highlights right on the pdf and not make notes on a piece of paper like I did...I had what page and paragraph BUT THE PARAGRAPHS AND PAGES MOVE when you make edits. Also, if you have the choice between a PC and a Mac to use Word for formatting, use the PC. There is just too much missing on the Word for Mac. Lastly, you can use a word document to upload to Createspace, however, A PDF is fixed and much safer. Word does not stay put as I mentioned. And Word Publisher is terrible for formatting. You can use free online software to formate you book. but I had Word so that is what I used. Good luck and hang in there. PS I have included a few helpful links...BUTTONS BELOW.
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June 2024
AuthorArtist, Buddhist, Educator, Traveller, Cabinet Maker, kayaker, etc and now writer! |