Making better ePubs and Kindle books
Word's Filtered HTML is not like pure filtered water. It's better than unfiltered HTML, in that Word-specific information is discarded, but there's a lot of icky stuff floating around in the pot that can drag down your efforts to create a clean and … [Continue Reading]
While you can create and package an ePub manually, Sigil is a simple but powerful ePub editor that will save you time. It can open your (X)HTML file and help you turn it into a valid ePub, or let you revise an existing ePub. Download … [Continue Reading]
Spectacular pencil drawings may be lousy candidates for book covers. What looks good on a wall can be a pain to transform into a decent cover that stands out in the Amazon catalog. There are several good reasons why you should think very hard about … [Continue Reading]
Several years ago, I wrote an article about making an NCX file manually. At that time, nearly everybody was using Mobipocket Creator to format Kindle books from Word or HTML files. Amazon decreed that an NCX (Navigation Control XML) file was … [Continue Reading]
There is no perfect full-screen or maximum size for interior images in an eBook although there is some agreement on universal dimensions that work on most eReader devices. eBook cover sizes have settled down*, but if you search for complete … [Continue Reading]
I just grabbed the latest version of Kindle Previewer (2.7) and a fresh copy of the Kindle Publishing Guidelines (2012.5) to see if cover image documentation had sorted out an apparent contradiction between the Guidelines and KDP Self-Publishing … [Continue Reading]
Forget what used to be the conventional wisdom about the Kindle inside cover image. A 600x800 pixel image still works best with eInk Kindles, but the newer Kindles and higher resolution eReader devices are rapidly coalescing around an emerging … [Continue Reading]
MakeUseOf offers some excellent free manuals and guides for many popular apps and devices. They've earned my respect and I just downloaded Your Unofficial Kindle Fire Manual by Christian Cawley. The download is free in exchange for a Tweet, Facebook … [Continue Reading]
As you probably know, Kindle cover images for the Amazon product catalog can be much larger in both dimensions and file-size than the cover that appears inside the book. The latest Kindle Publishing Guidelines spell it out. Interestingly, verbiage … [Continue Reading]
Important! Cover image production has changed since this post was written. Amazon now uses the large product image for the inside cover. The parts about how Kindlegen crunches large and/or high quality interior images still apply, but meticulous … [Continue Reading]