Help, please, for fixing five issues

[JohnMGoodman]

I need help. I published my wife's first book as a paperback a couple of months ago. Since then I have tried to convert it to an epub file using Calibre working on a .docx file created in Libre Office. The result is mostly right, but not quite what I need.

After I describe my problems, below, I'll suggest how I think I might best be helped--and I'd be happy to pay someone who gives me that help for their time and expertise.

I have no dedicated ebook reader. My only ways to view the epub are a free program on my Windows laptop or desktop or a different program on my Android cell phone. As a result, I'm not sure if the issues I've identified can be "fixed" nor if they will always be a problem on some viewers but not on others.

Specifically, my five issues are:

1) I want the paragraphs in the body copy to have a small first-line indent and have some space between paragraphs.

2) I use fonts to convey who is speaking at various points in the book; I want to embed those fonts so they'll show up correctly on at least many e-book readers.

3) Various headers are showing up without looking like headers. I'd like to insure they are bolded, centered, and perhaps slightly larger size than the surrounding text.

4) On my cell phone but not on my desktop some of the figures overlap the first one or two lines of text that follow them. This makes it hard to read that text.

5) I don't know if it is possible, but I'd like to have a "header" appear at the top of each screen to let the reader know what chapter they are in. That works fine in the paperback, but in the epub it seems not to show up at all, or the relevant header gets inserted somewhat randomly in the text.

NOW FOR MY SUGGESTION/REQUEST:

If you believe you can help me and wish to do so, I'd like to have a zoom meeting with you where we can discuss these issues (and I can show you what I mean) and you can then tell me if you can fix them and how you'd do that, and what you'd charge me to do it for me. (I do want to learn the how, but I really need to get this job out the door very soon, hence I'd like to have someone not just teach me, but also do the work for me.)

You can reach me via a reply to this post, or even quicker by an email to <john@agoodman.com>. FYI, I live in Southern California (and thus am in the Pacific Time Zone), and I mostly work in the afternoons and evenings, but can work on this in a morning if that is the only time that works for whoever helps me.

Thank you.

[Quoth]

(1), (2*), (3), (4)
All of these can be solved by doing paragraph styles directly in Word or LO Writer.

Also
Only single spaces
No tabs
No empty lines
Use a heading level in header paragraph styles
5) You can't have headers and footers on ebooks, except when an ereader (device or app) adds them.

2*) Fonts: This won't work on some phone apps, won't work ever on older Kindles and only work on later Kindles if the user manually selects Publisher in Theme. Various authors have done this and the reason you almost never see it on paper is that it's tiring to read. Good use of direct speech tags, "action" tags and context is what works. See also Terry Pratchett's "Witches Abroad" where you'd know which Witch is speaking even without tags.


I've been involved in paper document generation since 1981 and multimedia since 1992. I realised back in 2012 that with books you need to make and proof the ebook first. Buy a cheapest eink Kindle and also a 7″ or 8″ Kobo eink model. Convert the docx version styled for ebook (small page size, no headers or footers, no line height settings) to epub2 and proof on the Kobo. Use Kobo Utilities to read back annotations.
Amazon delivers mobi, azw3 or kfx to customers from an epub2 you upload via KDP. Smashwords & Google will use the same file. Smashwords will redistribute to Apple, Kobo, Barnes&Noble and others.
You can make mobi and azw from the epub2 on Calibre for local tests on the 6″ Kindle eink (A 2022 Basic will do). You can also make a dual mobi, purely for Kindle customers of Smashwords (as they can't automatically send the correct kind to a Kindle).
Look at Lithium and Pocketbook apps (free versions) on Android. Many free Android apps don't display correctly. I forget which app should be used on iOS/iPhone/iPad. The Apple Books id for ebooks bought from Apple. The Amazon Kindle app on iOS is like an old Kindle in display rendering, different from Amazon on Android (or Fire).
The Apple, Amazon, Kobo & Google ereader apps are best only for those stores.

Don't use direct formatting (alignment, indents, size, font), use styles. The two contentious exceptions are italics and bold of part of a paragraph, a whole Paragraph in Bold or Italic needs styled in the Paragraph style.
Only set spacing to sides or above /below a paragraph using Margin in Styles (Padding is mostly for page breaks).
Set an Insert page (no style) in style of any heading needing a new page. Don't use any page styles or manually inserted page breaks in an ebook.

When the ebook is perfect (content and formatting) you make a copy and set page styles for front matter, chapter first page, left page, right page and rear matter. Then set headers & footers as desired on the different page styles. Ensure large enough inner margin.
Paper may want different fonts to an ebook. The paper DPI is fixed. The ebook display in ereaders or apps can vary from about 82 dpi to 300 dpi. Screen size is 4.3″ (smallest Android phone), to 4.7″ (smallest eink) to 10″ or larger. The eink are mostly 4:3 shape and Android mostly 16:9 shape. So Paper version has absolute sized images but the larger ebook image CSS will need edited in Calibre to be either width: 90% height: auto or vice versa. They are centred in the wordprocessor by "Anchor as Character" and on their own line in paragraph that has a centre style of text.
Only use a newline instead of a new paragraph for multiline headings (headings too long for a small page or screen) which might be Shift Enter.

Directly export the PDF for paper print. Never upload them a docx.

[JohnMGoodman]

Thank you Quoth for your lengthy and very helpful reply. I shall implement as many of your suggestions as I can.

My experience with publishing on paper goes back a good deal farther than yours, at least to the mid-1970s, but with ebooks I am still a "newbie" and thus very appreciative of your expert advise.

[Quoth]

Mid 1970s! Some people still using movable type and separate plates for images?
Also only really big companies had computers available for text. I had to do weekly reports even in 1978 on a purely mechanical typewriter (it was huge, tall and black. Maybe pre-war, but which war!), my first real job, but we had a microwave oven! Wet and thermal copiers. Stencil duplicators. The 300 baud modems!

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by JohnMGoodman

I need help. I published my wife's first book as a paperback a couple of months ago. Since then I have tried to convert it to an epub file using Calibre working on a .docx file created in Libre Office. The result is mostly right, but not quite what I need.

After I describe my problems, below, I'll suggest how I think I might best be helped--and I'd be happy to pay someone who gives me that help for their time and expertise.

I have no dedicated ebook reader. My only ways to view the epub are a free program on my Windows laptop or desktop or a different program on my Android cell phone. As a result, I'm not sure if the issues I've identified can be "fixed" nor if they will always be a problem on some viewers but not on others.

Specifically, my five issues are:

1) I want the paragraphs in the body copy to have a small first-line indent and have some space between paragraphs.

2) I use fonts to convey who is speaking at various points in the book; I want to embed those fonts so they'll show up correctly on at least many e-book readers.

3) Various headers are showing up without looking like headers. I'd like to insure they are bolded, centered, and perhaps slightly larger size than the surrounding text.

4) On my cell phone but not on my desktop some of the figures overlap the first one or two lines of text that follow them. This makes it hard to read that text.

5) I don't know if it is possible, but I'd like to have a "header" appear at the top of each screen to let the reader know what chapter they are in. That works fine in the paperback, but in the epub it seems not to show up at all, or the relevant header gets inserted somewhat randomly in the text.

1. Paragraph space is not a good idea. It can take you out of the story.

2. If you need different fonts to show us who is speaking, then the book needs to be edited so you don't need different fonts.

3.
CSS Code

h2 {
  text-align: center;
  text-indent: 0;
  margin-top: 1em;
  margin-bottom: 1em;
}

HTML code

<h2>Chapter 1</h2>

4. Are these graphics of of text or are they something else?

5. See 3.

[Deskisamess]

Please don't use different fonts to delineate who is speaking. It makes a book look like it was formatted using Publisher 97.

And it's horrible to read.

Same with large spaces between paragraphs.

[Quoth]

That's 3 out of 3 people voting against fonts to indicate speaker.

[JohnMGoodman]

Thanks for all your helpful suggestions.

However, I have tried out my epub on my computer using the IceCream ebook reader, and on my Android cell phone using Lithium and PocketBook, and all three show up looking very much like the paperback--which was my goal. I don't, of course, know what it would look like on a Kindle or any other ebook reader, but I'm encouraged by what I've seen so far.

The fonts don't all look quite as I wish they would, but acceptably close. On my computer that may be because I have those fonts installed in Windows. On my cell phone I didn't do anything to install them (yet) so maybe if I did (perhaps using Sigil, as suggested by a video by Derek Murphy on YouTube) it would look better there. Still even without that it seems like something worth putting out in the world for now and see what the readers of it think.

[JohnMGoodman]

Actually, as I think about it, I was closely following best practices for commercial publishing from more-or-less the inside in the late 1960s when I was a consultant to Scientific American magazine for a couple of their issues. I worked closely with their Art Director and learned a lot about four-color printing, about page proofs including progressive proofs for color images, composition and imposition, etc.

Later on I was using press-type (rub-on letters) for some source material for publishing; also editing and creating a newsletter using I don't remember what all technology, but it sure wasn't computerized.

And if I really reach back, I learned all about hot lead type while I was in middle school around 1951, or so.

In any case, I've been around for a great many variations in the technology for publishing.

[Quoth]

Creating ebooks is not like web pages or paper books.

[ps67]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Creating ebooks is not like web pages or paper books.

Yes, there are many things that the publisher decides in a printed book and that anyone who reads an ebook, especially with an ereader, wants to choose himself or they just don't exist. For example: obviously book dimensions don't exist in ebooks (like epub, not pdf), one can read on devices ranging from 5" to 13" and if you read with a laptop the screen is even bigger. As for the margins the reader wants to decide them himself and also the font. The same goes for line spacing: every ereader has a system for making the reader choose them, more rudimentary or more refined but everyone (at least the ones I've seen) has it. Not to mention the font size, every eye wants its own.

By the way: I couldn't read a book printed with one font for each character.

[Fiat_Lux]

Originally Posted by ps67

For example: obviously book dimensions don't exist in ebooks (like epub, not pdf), one can read on devices ranging from 5" to 13" and if you read with a laptop the screen is even bigger.

I read epubs on my desktop with a 40 inch monitor.

By the way: I couldn't read a book printed with one font for each character.

I've seen a book in which every character had a different colour ink.