Making out-of-print titles into eBooks?

[csorensen]

I am currently working on a new novel that I hope is ready for distribution next year. I self published my first two books 10 years and 5 years ago, the first in hardcover, the second in paperback.

I would like to gain some experience with eBooks before my new title comes out by converting my old titles into eBooks.

I guess I'm trying to figure out where to start. I know there is the Nook and the Kindle...what is the best route to take to a) get them converted so they are available to the most systems and b) make them available to the most number of readers?

Any thoughts are greatly appreciated!

Chris

[nitaworm]

This is a good use of out of print titles

(1) get re-edit maybe even do some updated scenes
(2) take out all print focused formatting in doc. (I convert to .txt then put into msword) or (you can use Calibre to convert also)
(3) easiest place to publish and format for is amazon
(4) smashwords (read style guide thoroughly first) will publish it to other formats for you

Good luck!

[James D. Macdonald]

Assuming you have a good, clean text file:

Format the text for Smashwords, following the Smashwords style guide to the letter.

Take the same text, remove the words "Smashwords edition" from the copyright page, and save it as HTML (filtered). Upload this HTML text to Amazon.

You'll find certain small differences: Smashwords wants the cover to be 500x800. Kindle wants the cover to be 625x1000.

It's a fairly straight-forward process, though there is a bit of a learning curve in the original formatting of the clean text.


You'

[Medievalist]

Make sure you have the rights first. Some publishers are aggressively nasty.