Correcting minor style and formatting errors
Conversion to XHTML
Splitting chapters into separate pages
Create a Clickable Table of Contents
Create Logo / Title Image for copyright page
Create Original Book Cover Design

The Assassins Club by Dixon Bennett Rice
Book Cover Design
I enjoyed working with Dixon on creating this book cover. I provided 5 different thumbnail mockups, and then 2 full-size mockups. We then asked the Facebook Audience to vote. The consensus was the one you see on the page. This cover is a compilation of three images. I created three masked layers of the drink, reducing the opacity of one layer by 40% so the letters of the book title show through the glass stem.

The post The Assassins Club by Dixon Rice Bennett appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

Rodney sat down with me and we discussed how his adventure began from a simple dinnertime story to a series of farting books so popular, the response has been overwhelmingly powerful and has quickly exploded him to the top.

What made you decide to write about large flatulating pumpkins?

I wish I could tell you I had a bright idea and just had to put in on paper. But that’s not really what happened. The Flatulent Pumpkin was one of those spontaneous emissions. It happened at the dinner table and to keep the family laughing I immediately made up stories of a wise pumpkin that happened flatulent. It was at the center of town and gave out wisdom. But on some days its flatulence produced magic. I have a lovable, attentive and family and they were serious about me writing the story. Since I wasn’t a writer I didn’t take them to seriously. Then they got pushy, in a lovable way.

When did you first begin writing?

The first writing assignment I remember was from my school high school English teacher Ms. Walden. She had the class write an ending to Mark Twain’s Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County and read it out loud. When my turn came I remember reading my story and the class kept interrupting me with giggling. And when I appealed to Ms. Walden to stop the class from giggling, she didn’t. She just said it was too funny not to giggle. I never intended for it to be funny.

What first inspired you to become an author? Who or what continues to inspire you?
Although I’m a science fiction fan, my favorite author is James Michener. He’s got a way of wrapping history lessons in the middle of a captivating human interest story. You know you are in the middle of a history lesson, but that doesn’t matter. His story draws you in and compels you to move forward through our interest in humans stories.

Do you ever get so caught up in your own stories that it often blurs with reality?

I love that you’ve asked me. My initial response is “No”. I’ve never been a large flatulating pumpkin. But there is a joke in one of the stories, which started invading my dreams and I’d wake laughing.

What is your favorite genre?

Science fiction. Life without relevant science fiction would be a little dull. I like Orson Scott Card’s Enders Game.

Does anyone help you when you get stuck? Or do you go it alone?

It’s interesting when I hear writers have this thing called writer’s block. I guess I haven’t been a writer long enough. But I don’t get blocked – not really. I will walk away from an idea until the natural subconscious process moves it along.

I have no problem bouncing things off the family. In fact the Flatulent Pumpkin stories are a family project. In more ways than one it’s the most fun family project that’s ever existed.

Do you have any other hobbies besides writing?

I like a little of everything. I like sports and nature. I love history and exploring. The only thing I lack it time.

When writing The Flatulent Pumpkin did you know you were on to something special?

In the beginning I questioned everything. I didn’t know where to start nor how to write a story. In the middle of writing the second story what kept happening is that I’d leave my writing spot to bounce an idea off the family. We’d laugh hysterically and for thirty minutes we were still laughing. I remember telling them I had to get back to writing. This kept happening and happened while writing the third story.

Where did you come up with your ideas?

They come from anywhere and everywhere. I’m in that group with so many ideas 99% will never see the light of day. I’ll see, hear, connect two different concepts and the next thing you know poof, another compelling story! Mostly they come from paying very close attention to life around me. Somewhere in my process there is that age-old way of starting a story, “What if”.

What do you want people to walk away with?

Smiles, enlightenment and a better understanding of important facts about themselves.

Why did you decide to self publish?

My first rejection came frighteningly quick. I remember thinking the hours I spent researching and querying the agent was an unwise investment of time. I researched self-publishing operations. That’s when my business side of my background sprang forth and I marched ahead methodically and independently. I was also getting a lot of advice of what I consider the podcast university of publishing.

Would you say its been challenging?

Yes! In the traditional publishing model a group of professionals perform vital tasks. When you do what I did you are responsible for everything. I would advise any person considering self-publishing or independent publishing to investigate thoroughly. Know what you are getting in to.

The absolute best thing about independent publishing is that I choose the professionals I work with. I choose the editors. I choose the illustrator and book designer. For this alone its been the best decision for my project. I would also say I hit a home run with my illustrator, book designer and editors on the first try. Something tells me this is uncommon.

About Book Cover Design: How did you find your illustrator?

Gary Wein draws beautifully. I was lucky to find him on the internet site Ifreelance.com. I posted a project on the site seeking an illustrator for a children’s book series. I received quite a few replies from prospective illustrators. Gary’s artistic signature stood well above the rest. I eventually found he was very easy to work with and had a sense of humor which complemented the project. I think its hard to improve on this combination, but he did. His attention to detail is epic. His patience and his enthusiasm to paint my vision surprised me. He said he wasn’t finished until I was completely satisfied.

Although Gary is my first an only illustrator, from what I’ve read about the process, our methods are quite involved. It starts with me and my family deciding which scenes to illustrate. I provide Gary with the appropriate passage and scene set up. He provides a sketches until we agree on the final. Sometimes it only takes a sketch or two. Usually we are modifying the scene by adding, taking away and/or rearranging. Sometimes its taken up to six or so to finalize the sketch for one picture.

Then Gary starts painting. Its always a great day in our house when one of his paintings come in an email. His paintings are so full of color and so rich in detail, you almost can’t take your eyes away. And sometimes when we think Gary is finished, he keeps going and going, adding details we never considered.

I think the Flatulent Pumpkin series has one of the world’s great illustrators.

What has been the reception to your books?

Unbelievably positive. Extraordinary. Stellar. Outstanding. People are first stunned when they read the story titles. Then comes a smile and more smiles. The reaction is always the same.

Rodney can honestly smile and enjoy the fragrance of success.

“Stuck in the middle of almost nowhere is the little town of Darlina – a place where NOTHING happens, until today. Ten-year-old J.J. and the townspeople witness the strange and unpredictable farting of a giant, magical pumpkin. Curiosity turns to excitement when the pumpkin POPS! and J.J. Disappears! Determined to get to the bottom of this phenomenon, the mayor looks to the sheriff, who shrieks in fright each time the pumpkin sounds off. Who will help J.J? and What will the pumpkin do next? Learn and laugh as this innocent vegetable transforms life in Darlina – one fart at a time.”

“The Flatulent Pumpkin Series” (Available through Amazon)

• The Flatulent Pumpkin
• The Case of the Plucked Chicken
• The Fart WHO came to Dinner
• Gone With the Wind
• Curse of the Downwind
• The Pocket Guide to Cutting the Cheese
• A Fart and a Smile

The post The Sweet Smell of Flatulence. Interview with Author, Rodney Evans appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

How it Works

Authors can now type “amzn.com/” plus a product number (ISBN or ASIN) to create a short URL, without needing sites like tinyurl.com and bit.ly.

For example, when promoting JOOLA: Africa’s Titanic on Twitter, I took the products ASIN number (listed on the product page) and added it to the end of amzn.com. JOOLA: Africa’s Titanic ASIN number (Amazon Standard Identification Number) is B00AM0G3L8 so the shortened URL would be amzn.com/B00AM0G3L8.

I then created a Twitter post and included the shortened URL link:

LE JOOLA capsizes 17 mi. off the African coast. The harrowing true stories and shameful actions of those responsible. amzn.com/B00AM0G3L8

Amazon Wishlists

This technique also works for Amazon Wishlists. Simply type “amzn.com/w/” plus the Wishlist ID number, which is usually located at the end of a person’s Wishlist URL.

Benefits

The primary benefit is on Twitter. With only 140 characters of posting space, using shortened URLS is essential. It is also a great way to cross-promote your other writing in your ebooks.

NOTE: you do not need to add the http://www to the front of the URL. Twitter knows this is a link, and thus saves you 11 more characters.

The post Marketing Tip: Easy Shortened URLs for Amazon Authors appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

This non-fiction narrative recounts one of the worst maritime disasters in history, the sinking of Le Joola – which tore at the soul of a country. Patrick Wiley’s interviews with survivors and extensive in-country research revealed the shameful loss of life and incredible accounts of survival that form the heart of the book.

“Le JOOLA, Africa’s Titanic”
Non-Fiction Narrative on
One of the worst Maritime Accidents in History,
the sinking of the West African, Senegal ferry

by Patrick Wiley

(Please leave feedback).

BUY ON AMAZON http://www.amazon.com/JOOLA-Africas-Titanic-Survivors-ebook/dp/B00AM0G3L8

Excerpt:

At eleven o’clock, the Joola was seventeen miles off the African coast—eight hours away from her scheduled arrival in Dakar. The rain had stopped but she was still in the grip of the squall. Lightning flashes illuminated an angry sea in the black void surrounding the ship. Wind and waves were lashing into the starboard beam as it steamed through the night with the conspicuous list to the port side. Minutes before, the hard rain had driven most of the passengers from the upper deck. A few small groups remained—some enjoying the spectacle of the storm, others preferring the cool air to the sweltering conditions inside. Many were still jammed in the stairwell—trying to get down into the crowded restaurant. Big seas were now aggravating the list and the Joola began rolling farther to her port side. Still, most thought it wasn’t excessive—at least not to the extent to trigger alarm. There was no indication of passengers becoming frightened. The singing and dancing continued in the restaurant—packed with students and partying passengers for whom the night was still young.

Down below in the third-class compartments, passengers were far more insulated from what was happening outside. Their primary concern was trying to get comfortable in their overcrowded quarters and dealing with the stifling heat. Most eyes were glued to the television, unaware of any deteriorating conditions affecting the Joola.

After the rain stopped, strong gusts from the squall continued to howl through the superstructure. Six to nine foot white-capped waves were charging across the sea. Ben Bechir Badji and others on the top deck could see them rolling into and underneath the ship. The Joola’s radar, if it were operating, would have allowed the crew to track the approaching storm and the pilothouse provided a good view of the worsening weather conditions, but there was nothing about the seas and wind to cause alarm—unless the crew was aware the Joola’s stability had been seriously compromised.

Squalls were common this time of year—the crew had been through them before. This time, however, everything was adding up wrong. The boat listing to port was testimony to the fact that something was out of order with either cargo loading or ballast. Having only one engine running further compounded the problem, and limited the crew’s options to respond to an emergency. The crew should have noticed that the seas were coming on the starboard side and aggravating the list. But what happened next, at 11pm, was so unexpected; it was a shock to both passengers and crew.

The Joola, suddenly, began listing further and further onto her side. There was no warning from the crew…no one saw, heard, or felt anything…other than the terrifying sensation of the deck slipping out from under them. At first, when passengers felt the steep incline of the deck, they thought it was a rolling motion from the waves—praying the ship would roll back. Passengers near the cargo deck heard the rumble of vehicles sliding and crashing onto the port bulkheads. The Joola continued to heel…higher and higher…exposing her flat bottom hull to the surging waves.

BUY ON AMAZON http://www.amazon.com/JOOLA-Africas-Titanic-Survivors-ebook/dp/B00AM0G3L8

The post Le JOOLA: Africa’s Titanic, non-fiction narrative on martime accident appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

OPTION ONE  - CREATING A LINK TO THE YOUTUBE VIDEO

1. Go to the Youtube video you want to embed
2. Choose “Share”
3. Copy the http://…. Link in the field

Go to your post where you want the video

1. Click Upload/Insert – the small icon above the content field on your post (WordPress). A popup appears.
2. Click “From URL” at the top
3. Check the button “Audio, Video, or Other File”
4. Paste the URL you copied from YouTube (http://…) into the first field
5. Type in a Title of the video- this will be your text link.
   
6. Click “insert into Post”
7. This will make a “LINK” to the video on Youtube
   

OPTION TWO – EMBEDDING THE VIDEO ON YOUR PAGE

Go to the Youtube video you want to embed

1. Choose “Share”
2. Click “Embed”
3. Scroll down to choose the size you want
4. Copy the entire code <iframe…. Etc

Then on your post,

1. Switch to HTML View (top right of the content field)
2. Paste the code where you want it.

This embeds the file into the post.

The post Embedding YouTube Videos in your blog appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

One major issue is the OS requirement for Mac users. While the previous stable version (0.5.3) was compatible with 10.6+ (x64 only), the latest release requires the user to update their OS to at least 10.7+.

I have not fully evaluated the program, from what I can see it is vastly improved in many areas.

A major benefit is the ability to create the toc.htm page with a click of a button. Though the page is created using DIV tags instead of (my preferred) P or paragraph tags, it is an immense time saver for those long and complicated Table of Contents.

Sigil Epub Editor Download:
http://code.google.com/p/sigil/downloads/list

To download a depreciated version, choose “Depreciated Downloads” from the Search and type in Sigil for all offerings.

The post Sigil Epub Editor 6.0 Released appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

Note: Not all e-reader devices may display these CSS properties.

The following example centers a paragraph inside a block with a certain height.

Here is an example:

CSS

div.container { 
   min-height: 10em; 
   display: table-cell; 
   vertical-align: middle;
}

HTML

<div class="container"> 
<p>This small paragraph... 
</div>

The post CSS: Center Text Vertically appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

Here is an example:

CSS

img.individual {
    display: block;
    margin-left: auto;
    margin-right: auto;
}

HTML

<IMG class="individual" src="..." alt="...">

Castle Rock, John Day Area, Oregon

CSS for all images to be centered

img {
    display: block;
    margin-left: auto;
    margin-right: auto;
}

HTML

<IMG src="..." alt="...">

The post CSS: Center Images Using Display:Block and Margin appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

At times, in both nonfiction and fiction ebook formatting, you may want to set off an area of text from the rest of the content. The easiest way to center text blocks is to set the margins to ‘auto’ along with a fixed width. Without the fixed width, the block would simply fill the available width of the screen.

Here is an example:

CSS

p.blocktext {
    margin-left: auto;
    margin-right: auto;
    width: 6em
}

HTML

<p class=”blocktext”> This is a very narrow block of text that is centered….

Modify the width to the exact measurement desired. You can also use a percentage value if desired.

The post CSS: Center Text Blocks using margin and fixed-width appeared first on First Steps Publishing.

Sigil is a free, open-source ebook editing program. This step-by-step manual will show you the incredible capabilities and functions of the Sigil Ebook Editor program so you can create ebooks for epub and mobi.

~ ~ ~

I created this manual as a Basic User Guide for authors wanting to use the free, open source program Sigil Ebook Editor. Though Sigil has an online manual, it was written for the anticiapted release of Sigil 0.6.0. Unfortunately the most current stable version is 0.5.3, of which some features to be introduced are not yet available in 0.5.3.

The following is an excerpt from the user guide…

About this book

This book was written with the author in mind. It is not a CSS / HTML training course for those planning to do formatting as a career. It is simply a manual showing the capabilities of the Sigil E-book Editor. For in-depth resources on HTML and CSS, please see the References section of this book.

It is not necessary to understand what an e-book really is or how HTML formatting actually works to use Sigil, but learning the very basics will enable you to take advantage of advanced features in the program.

At first glance, you may find the Sigil interface intimidating. I promise it is a lot easier than it looks. And the more time you spend in the Sigil program, the more comfortable you will become.

The Lost Sigil E-Book Editor Manual covers the basic functions new users need to know in order to create a well-formatted and validated e-book. I highlight important topics such as:

• Navigating the workspace
• Features and Functions
• How to import your manuscript
• How to set styles
• How to set up your metadata
• How to create a table of contents
• How to decipher and correct validation errors

Expectations

Do not assume this book is an easy answer to all your e-book formatting needs. It is not. This is probably your first stab at formatting, so expect a learning curve. This book is a stepping-stone to help you understand the basic process of formatting and is geared for the author with limited technical knowledge; (repeat) it is not intended as an advanced college-level programming course.

Sigil E-book Editor
v. 5.3

(July 2012)

Sigil Changelog

Sigil is continually in a state of change. The Lost Sigil E-Book Editor Manual is based on the most current stable version at the time of publication – 0.5.3.

In June 2012, Sigil temporarily released 5.9 Beta as a precursor to an anticipated 6.0 release with a variety of improvements. Actual release date for 6.0 is not known at this time.

What is an e-book format?

To avoid confusion, I will use the term HTML when referring to Sigil pages, which may be either HTML or XHTML.

Mobi and epub e-books are miniature web pages. That’s an extreme oversimplification, but essentially true. The foundation of the epub or mobi format is HTML or HyperText Markup Language, which is also the main markup language for web pages.

E-books (epub and mobi) are created just like a website. Your book, like a website, has several pages that are linked together using a visual navigation or clickable table of contents.

HyperText Markup Language (HTML or HTM) is the main markup language for web pages and epub/mobi e-books.

What is the Sigil E-book Editor?

Sigil (sigillum) in Latin means “small seal” or “signet”. The word “sigla” (according to Wikipedia) also stands for an abbreviation used in medieval manuscripts.

Sigil is a free multi-platform product supported by Windows, Mac, Linux and other operating systems.

Originally developed by Strahinja Marković in 2009 it has been maintained by John Schember since 2011.

As a cross-platform application, it is distributed for the Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X and Linux platforms under the GNU GPL license. Sigil supports both WYSIWYG and code-based editing of EPUB files, as well as the import of HTML and plain text files.

What is WYSIWYG?

Sigil’s e-book editor displays your book’s content in WYSIWYG (what you see is what your get). This means that any styles and formatting you apply will display in the window similarly to the way the reader will see it on his or her e-reader device.

WYSIWYG (pronounced wizzywig) is not 100% accurate. Content displayed using WYSIWYG is only similar to the actual output. Therefore, it is important you visually proof your book on the devices it is intended for prior to publishing to ensure it displays exactly the way you want.

Sigil Help

The Lost Sigil Ebook Editor Manual will not answer all your e-book formatting questions. Fortunately, there are numerous online resources as well as an entire community of Sigil users, wikis and FAQs to help.

The Sigil community offers a tremendous amount of help and advice. Additionally, if you experience defects or bugs in the program, take the time to report the issue so it can be fixed in the next update.

The following links take you directly to Sigil’s online help and advice sections.

• Sigil Forum Mobileread (Help)
• Wiki Documentation
• Online Manual
• FAQs
• Updates (as they happen)
• Deciphering Errors
• Reporting Errors
• Submit a Feature Request
• Installation Instructions
• Donate

=========

“The Lost Sigil Ebook Editor Manual”

The post The Lost Sigil Ebook Editor Manual appeared first on First Steps Publishing.