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In this interview, author and ebook formatter/publisher Moriah Jovan gives us tips on the best way to format ebooks and how the romance genre led the way.
Moriah Jovan is the author of romance novels The Proviso and Stay. She also runs a digital publishing business B10 Mediaworx with the Peculiar Pages imprint.
In this podcast you will learn:
- How Moriah started writing and why she loves the romance genre. How books are an escape from real life and you can revisit the first rush over and over again. How her book, The Proviso is a modern take on Hamlet with 3 romances for the price of 1! You can read more of The Proviso here.
- The changes in the book industry have resulted in much better tools for ebook creation. The different formats have changed as well. People generally now want a Kindle format ebook or an ePub.
- Why ebooks are so exciting because you can have your library in your pocket so you can read anywhere. There are differing opinions on what an ebook should and shouldn't be, and this debate will only continue as ebook sales grow.
- How the romance genre has been in ebooks for several years. They have been ahead of the pack in terms of digital publishing. Moriah modeled herself on Samhain and Ellora's Cave
- On the bookstore of the future, which will enable bookstores to sell any books with a print on demand model using the Espresso Book Machine. Book buyers can browse and then get physical books printed without the book store keeping a massive inventory.
- If you want to do formatting yourself, then you need to know HTML and CSS. OR/ you can go to Smashwords and just add a Word document (with no formatting). If you hire an ebook formatter, be clear on what you want or just ask. You don't need to know what goes on “under the hood”. You need a format for Kindle and you can get into the other stores through Smashwords.
- As an indie author, you need to be prepared to play and get into it. Consider the ‘fail early, fail fast idea' as an indie.
- Moriah also recommends Twitter for book promotion. Her top tip is to focus on the right people to follow and to accept it is like a cocktail party where the conversation is ephemeral. It's about creating relationships.
You can find Moriah and her books at MoriahJovan.com
Ebooks *are* exciting. I’ve yet to make the jump to an e-reader myself, but, as an author, I can’t tell you how much I love all the options that are available. It’s a pleasure to be able to offer books to readers at a much lower price – and I admit, I also love the way they fly off the virtual shelf!
I have a couple of questions about this one:
– so I have quite a lot of experience with HTML and CSS – is there any advantage me formatting books using HTML/CSS? Why not just use Smashwords? Is something sacrificed if you don’t format them yourself?
– what is the difference between Scrivener, Smashwords, and Draft2Digital?
– has the technology evolved since this interview(2010)? or is it still .epub & .pcr files?
I wondered if youd done a show about copyright issues as I think that’d make for a great discussion.
Sorry for all the comments. I’m listening to a lot of your shows I’m afraid, and I can usually think of questions to go with them! (annoying git alert!)
David.