Muddling By – The Ebook

Well, that didn’t take long. Ebook from paperback in less than an hour, or two, or maybe I’m not done yet. Or maybe it is just fine. Deleted the page numbers, trimmed the book cover, massaged a few things, clicked some buttons, and Muddling By – the ebook has been launched. I hope. Someday I’ll get an ebook reader.

Maybe I’ll get an ebook reader again. I had one years ago. I entered a sweepstakes that I suspected few knew about, and won an early iPad. I still have it. The screen isn’t quite broken, but some cable may be broken because the display is colored like a tie-dye shirt. Colorful, but hard to read around.

For everyone else, it makes sense to make an ebook. When ebooks were a new thing, there was a surge that made it look like 50% of book sales would be ebooks. Now that electronic bookshelves have been filled with classics, series, and old familiar titles, ebook sales are down to ~20%. Not bad. Some folks won’t read any other way.

Muddling By was published as a paperback through kdp (aka Kindle). That process has been chronicled in this blog. The ebook process is built-in, mostly. Ideally, amazon/kdp already has the text and the cover graphics, but I needed to take out the page numbers because ebooks don’t have fixed page counts, and had to trim the cover to only being the front without the spine or back cover. Not a big deal, I think.

I went to the library (Port Hadlock) to use the latest software on conventional Windows computers. Fire up the web browser. Open my laptop in my lap. Log into kdp on the library computer. On the page for the paperback, it asks if I want an ebook. Click. Done? Nope.

Edit the format and the cover as I mentioned. Upload the new files. Pick a price, which in this case is $6, because the semi-prequel, Dream. Invest. Live. was priced at $6. Pick a royalty package, which I can’t recall as I type. Hit Submit. And wait.

I sat down at 10:15. At 10:59, I logged off, stood up, and headed home.

Things have changed since my first ebook in 2002. Communication speeds were slower. The industry was trying to establish protocols, security, and rights management. As I recall, the process took days, if not weeks.

In 2025, the industry has decided on standards which seem to work. Good.

As an author, it is good to provide an ebook. Many people are reading on small screens in dark places, whether that’s on a bus commute, in a dim lunch spot, or in bed with the rest of the lights out. Some of my friends need, not just want, a much larger font. The concept of an ebook sells itself; I’ll skip the argument for it.

As a speaker, it is good to have a digital copy available on a portable device. I use paperbacks with lots of paper tabs on specific sections, but tabs fall out, if there are too many then it is hard to distinguish one from the rest, and it can look messy. Ebook bookmarks are neater, and finding something that isn’t marked is a simple search. My speaking style is extemporaneous, so I usually arm wave the specific quote by paraphrasing myself. Besides, it is embarrassing to find a typo or a misquote in front of an audience. So, I rarely read at a reading, but I have a device available.

But my finances have improved since Dream. Invest. Live. and the technology has improved, so maybe I’ll buy a new machine. Sure, I could download the ebook to my laptop, but I want to get a copy that will be in a similar format to what my readers read.

Finishing a book isn’t one goal. Finishing a book is an action with several hurdles to clear. Write the book. Publish the book. Promote the book. Create the ebook. Schedule the talks (in progress). Submit the paperback to the Library of Congress (which might be in some disarray while the politicians try to decide what it means to run a nation.)

There’s more work to do.

As I’ve written before, I am a B Writer. kdp found a typo that Grammarly, Google Docs, and MS Word missed. For a ~50,000-word book, a 99% score suggests ~500 errors. I expect there are fewer than 50 errors, a 99.9% success rate. I’m sure as readers read, some will pass along errors, opinions, critiques, and reviews. I’ll brace myself, but this is my tenth book, and I have experience with what needs to be fixed, what folks want fixed, and what I might fix if I release a revised edition. Stay tuned to see what happens.