How to Publish with PubIt

(this is an overdue companion to How to Publish on Create Space and How to Use Create Space Cover creator and How to Publish on Smashwords)

Go to http://pubit.barnesandnoble.com/, log in and then choose Go to My Titles in the upper right corner

Choose “Add a Title”

This opens a new page where you need to enter your title, list price, publication date, publisher, and contributors. These are you – as the author – and then any illustrators, co-authors, etc. You are allowed up to five.

Scroll down to upload your book. B&N accept word documents, HTML, RTF and TXT files. Us the browse button to locate your file, then click Upload & Preview. (You may get warning that you have not filled in all the information, but don;t worry, we’re coming to that)

This will upload an instant preview. you can use the tabs to switch between Nook and Nook Color views. use the Prev and Next at the bottom to navigate the pages. When you’re finished use the close preview in the upper right:

If the conversion looks good, then it’s time to upload your cover. (if not, make changes to the interior file and reupload.)  Your cover image MUST be a .jpg and has to be at least 750 pixels tall, but no bigger than 2000. To upload the cover use the browse button.

The cover preview will look a little fuzzy, but it will look fine on your final page:

Now to fill out the pesky questions that caused all those crabby “errors”.  They’re pretty easy: Do you have an ISBN? Is the book part of a series? Is it available in print and, if so, how many pages is it? Is it public domain? What group is it suited for? What language is it in? Where do you have publishing rights (aka, US, IS?Canada, or World Wide) and do you want DRM protection?

Now you want to add the categories your book fits in. Click the add/edit categories button

This drops down a box, and each selection you make may open another box to the right. When you have it chosen, click the Add Category button

You can choose up to five categories for your book, though you don;t have to pick that many (I have only three). When you’re done, click Save.

Now it’s time to enter your keywords (separated by commas), your book description and your author bio. You can also enter editorial reviews if you have them.

Double check that everything is the way you want it, and then it’s time to put your title on sale! Check mark the box to confirm that you own the work and hit “Put on Sale”

And that’s it! Now you just need to wait 24 – 72 hours for your book to become available through B&N.

On a side note, there was a rumor that Barnes & Noble promotes books published through pubit over those through Smashwords, so i have done some experimenting.

I published Ties of Blood directly through PubIt because, at the time,  Smashwords was having trouble getting books out to them and I had some Nook readers who wanted to read it. Though the advice was to remove the Nook version as soon as the Smashwords version showed up, I’ve left both to see what happened.  As you can see on the listing page, the smashwords version has the priority listing and you have to use the + NOOK book button to even get the PubIt published version:

This might have to do with the fact that Smashwords has an older Publication date.  When it comes to slaes it stands thus:

PubIt edition all time: 4 (all were sold before the smashwords version cleared)

Smashwords edition (through B&N for December only): 31

So, it’s safe to say that in this case that B&N isn’t pushing the pubit version over the smashwords. Whether it happens to other people I can’t say.

 

eBooks Color?

Since I do book covers and formatting for other authors, in addition to my own, I get a lot of questions about whether or not to include images in ebooks, and whether those images need to be black and white.

The short answer is: Yes, put in as many pictures as you want (so long as you can compress them to the file size limit for your publisher of choice) and leave them in color.

Barns & Noble have the color Nook. Though Kindle may be in black and white, the kindle applications for PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone, and Android are in color. Not to mention that there are plenty of other brands of eReaders with color displays.

There is one thing to keep in mind, though, especially for technical diagrams. If readers use a gray scale device, such as kindle, the color image will be displayed in black and white. If you use images for tables, charts, etc you need to make sure that the colors have a good contrast so that readers can still distinguish the segments, or arrows, from one another.  As for general illustrations, you’re probably fine.

Personally, I think it’s only a matter of time until all the ereaders are in color, and the black and white issue becomes a moot point. In the meantime, if you’re worried about how your images will appear in black and white, then try this “converter” – http://tjshome.com/imageconverter.php. Choose the black and white option (It’s the first one) then choose your image and hit the submit button.  If you want you can right click on the results and save the converted image to your computer.

 

 

 

eBook Primer

I was talking with my postmistress the other day and she asked me when my next book will be out. I told her that it would be out in eBook around the end of May. She gave me that strange look that my mom gave me when I told her the same thing and I knew I would have to explain it to her. It became a lengthy discussion and one that I thought might benefit some people here.

Adobe Acrobat (.PDF)

Adobe Acrobat is a free program you can download from www.adobe.com for your computer or PDA. This format is the most popular because it can be read from your computer screen or imported to a Palm or Pocket PC and can even be printed.

HTML

HTML is the most versatile of the formats. It can be read from your computer using your browser, convert to your favorite eBook reader’s required format (such as the Rocketbook, the Hiebook, and the REB series readers), sent via email directly to your Kindle, and opened by a word processing program such as Microsoft Word or Open Office. You can print this file, but it will print as one continuous page.

Mobipocket/Kindle/Nook

Mobipocket, Kindle, and Nook each have free programs and apps designed specifically for PDAs such as a Palm or a Pocket PC.  They also have an interface that allows for reading on your computer. Printing isn’t allowed.

Microsoft Reader

You can download this free reader from http://www.microsoft.com/reader. Microsoft Reader can be read from either your PC or from your Pocket PC. It’s easy to use, the program is shaped to look like a book and it has read-aloud capabilities. This reader, however, does not allow for printing.

Now this isn’t the whole list, because there are a lot of different readers and formats out there, but here are a few of the most popular. Feel free to add to the list in the comments.

Color E-books

While many of the current ebook publishers shy away from images in the body of your manuscript, or even discourage them, ala smashwords, Barnes & Noble has obviously decided that colored pictures are the way to go.

By abandoning the e-ink and going to LCD screens, the new color Nook makes image rich ebooks user friendly, and allows you to do a handful of other social networking things as well. I’m not going to get into the specs, since I’m not advertising for it, but the point is that if this catches on the “discouraged” images in ebooks may soon be “encouraged” images, which is great news for independent graphic novelists, children’s books, photo books and others which are forced primarily into the dead tree versions due to high graphic content, and then cost a consumer double digits to purchase.  I, for one, have no intention of paying well over $20 for a children’s picture book, unless my dearest, sweetest friend is involved in the project. But, if the color ebook reader catches on, maybe I won’t have to, even if some madcap friend of mine publishes it.

(for more info see: http://www.engadget.com )