Here’s a funny thing:
The people emailing me to tell me how wrong I was when I decided to remove my works from Smashwords (and even the occasional person who has chosen to tell me in a public forum) outnumber the people who ever downloaded my novellas from Smashwords by nearly two to one. If all of you had actually purchased a copy while they were up, that might have been enough, all by itself, to keep them there.
Never let it be said, though, that I can’t change my ways. I’m still not happy with the look and feel of ebooks as they exist now, nor am I happy with the amount of control over these aspects an author must give up in order to create one. I’m still not happy with a system that tells me there is a reason my submission cannot be accepted, but not what that reason actually is.
I certainly still do not accept the argument that “people only want your words, they don’t care about formatting or page layout or book design.” If this is the case, then:
- Why have authors who choose to self-publish in print been told for so long that their books will be ugly because they don’t know enough about page layout and book design to ensure there are no widows, orphans, rivers, etc?
- Why do people go into a bookstore or library, pick up a book, look at the front cover, flip it over and look at the back, open the book and scan a few pages, far too quickly to be reading, and then finally begin to read the book? What are they looking at, if not page layout? What are they looking at, if not the typeface, the way the text block sits on the page, the headers and footers, etc? I have no doubt that a large part, perhaps a majority, of these people couldn’t begin to tell you what they’re looking at, but I submit that page layout and book design are far more important than most readers realize, and that it is this fact more than any other aspect of the ebook revolution that will kill reading, if it is not corrected. Books will simply become too ugly, and people will stop reading.
Nonetheless…
I have decided to acquiesce to the proddings of these people, since I assume (nudge, nudge, elbow, elbow) that each and every one of you will go and buy a copy as soon as I can get them back up. Actually, I don’t, but if Joe Konrath and Zoe Winters can make a zillion bucks apiece selling their novellas, then who am I to stand on the sidelines?
Because you care about the layout and look of your content, I thought you were right not to go with Smashwords — or at least right to format your content as a pdf file. Given current e-reader tech limitations, I don’t see any reliable alternative to taking total control via pdf, even with all the frustrations that format might cause for readers. (The need to pan/zoom, etc.)
As regards this –
– I had never thought about this familiarization process before, but you’re right: something is definitely happening in those actions and observations. The (prospective) reader is definitely making a more informed decision simply by flipping through the book and looking at the covers.
If I analyze my own actions in doing so, I think I’m probably coming at the question from a negative point of view. What is it that I’m going to see when I look at this cover, or the insides of the dust jacket, or the text, or the style of the text, that is going to put me off?
In essence, I’m looking for deal breakers that will keep me from taking the next step of actually reading the contents. Was the book blurbed by someone that I don’t like? (That’s a very bad sign.) Is the jacket copy hyping the contents? (There’s no way any book is going to change my world.) Is the general presentation of the book breathless (bad) or honest and straight-forward (good)?
As to the disparity between the people who are willing to tell you how you live your life, and the people who are willing to HELP you live your life, that’s not really a surprise, is it?
.-= Mark Barrett´s last blog ..The Internet as Relief Valve =-.
Mark, I freely admit that for most of my work, being as picky as I am about the formatting is probably verging toward OCD behavior. If the whole thing would be in one typeface anyway, who cares if it’s Garamond or not? (Well, of course, I do, but…) I’d really rather people read my books than not, so I’m going to give it another try.
Being somewhat beyond the average age of internet citizens, I can remember going to websites (except we didn’t call them that, because Al Gore hadn’t invented the internet yet) that were formatted entirely in extended ASCII, and somehow the “look and feel” has moved beyond that anyway, so perhaps I’m a bit too pessimistic regarding the future of books, e or otherwise.