Taking the Mystery Out of Formatting

When I began entertaining the idea of self-publishing my novel Finding My Escape, the one aspect out of the whole process that daunted me the most was the idea of formatting for the various e-reading devices.  Writing I could do.  It's my passion.  I wasn't overly concerned about editing or proofreading.  My mother was a high school English teacher with a strong understanding of the elements of style.  I wasn't even overly worried about marketing the book.  But formatting?  Major dread.

So there my book sat, completed, edited, re-edited, proofread, re-proofread.  I even paid an artist, to do an awesome cover.  (Pretty cool, if I do say so myself.)

I'd run out of excuses.  There was nothing left to do (unless I wanted to try to publish traditionally, but that's an entirely different topic).  So I set myself a deadline.  August 15.  My late father's birthday.  *sigh*  That was two weeks ago.  In that two weeks, I talked about formatting, I posted about formatting, I complained about formatting, but did absolutely nothing toward getting the book ready to e-publish.

Friday the 12th rolls around, and I drag out every paper and e-book I have that has anything on the subject of self-publishing.  I picked up Zoe Winter's Becoming An Indie Author (on my Nook, of course), and zipped to the section on Smashwords and read it.  Twice.

Okay, I thought, you can do this.  I went to the Smashwords site, and followed every single instruction about unformatting and reformatting my book (which BTW are very detailed and written in easy-for-a-non-techy-to-understand English).  I read with trepidation, the list of formatting problems that could cause your book to be rejected.  After about three hours of cleaning up bad tabs, straight quotation marks, and page breaks, the manuscript was ready.  I took a deep breath and pressed send.  About ten minutes later the results came back.  Rejected.

What?  Rejected?  After I scraped myself from the ceiling, I scrolled down the list of possible problems and found:  Font size exceeds 18.  The only font that could have possibly exceeded the suggested 18 point was the title.  I changed that to 18 and pushed send again.  Accepted!

So here's the point.  I'd spent weeks months postponing publishing my book because I was terrified by the thought of formatting it.  When I actually sat down to do it, it turned out to be no big deal.

So what's holding you back from completing your goal?  Is it fear?  Why not dig in, face the situation, and take the mystery out of it.  You'll be glad you did.

Finding My Escape - Prologue

I'm so excited about Finding My Escape, getting it finished.  So close. 
Here's an excerpt:

He looked down at the knife in his left hand, dripping in blood. Pausing from his task, he listened to the sound of labored breathing coming from the other room. The gasping became slower and heavier, then stopped. Charles Jordan was dead. The killer laughed.

Back to work.

He turned his handsome blond head toward the woman splayed on the kitchen floor in front of him. He’d hit her pretty hard, but this gal was tough. Grabbing her tangled hair, he jerked her into a sitting position and placed the bloody knife under her throat.

"Tell me where you hid the chip."

"No!" she gasped. The man watched as Liz Jordan’s dark eyes darted wildly at the clock.

"Where’s your daughter Liz?" he hissed in her ear, pulling the knife ever so slightly into her throat.

The woman’s eyes grew wide for a second, but quickly veiled again.

"She’s spending the night with a friend."

"You’re lying!" He dug the knife deeper. A drop of blood trickled down her neck and dripped on the white tile floor.

"Tell me where that chip is, or I’ll kill her, too."

"Okay, I’ll tell you, but pl..please," she sputtered, "I’m begging, don’t hurt her. Th..there's a key to a safety deposit box taped under the table. First Bank of Marietta. Main branch. Please," she gasped, "Hannah has nothing to do with this."

The man reached under the table with his free hand and found a key. Smirking, he slipped it into his pocket. He looked down at the woman. Her eyes were pleading.

"Thanks, Mrs. Jordan. Now, I just have one piece of unfinished business."

He paused, savoring the thought of slashing Liz Jordan’s beautiful white throat.

"Mom?" came a girl’s voice from the front door.

The broken woman below him stirred as she struggled now to raise her head. He could read the desperation in her eyes. The man tightened his grip and put his finger to his mouth to indicate silence, but the woman was already screaming.

"Don’t come in here honey, RUN!"

He covered the woman’s mouth to stifle one last cry before slashing her throat. Then he headed toward the sound of the girl's voice. Hannah Jordan was going to wish she'd missed her curfew.

I'm still polishing, so this part will probably get another shine, too!