You will likely feel as though MS Word, that friendly, accommodating little word processing program, just grew batwings, horns, and became a domineering, cross old school marm with a thick ruler trained at your virgin knuckles. Ideally, you will do this when you first start to write your book so you can make corrections as you go however, there is a strong chance that by the time you pick up this book, you have already written your own. Now that you have set your options, pick your way back through your book and look at the corrections the program made. Poor grammar, bad sentence structure, misspellings, and incorrect word usage are a quick ticket into the oblivion of identification as a mediocre, illiterate, careless writer. All of these points are ones you will learn more about if you read On Writing by Stephen King or take a good grammar course. It will tell you when you are using sentence fragments. It will tell you when you are using a passive voice, which does not read well due to how our brains interpret words. It will tell you when you are getting too wordy, at which time you should find a simpler way to express your message. This is going to cause MS Word to get very bossy with you, but ultimately, will result in a tighter, better product.
Set the first three options as highlighted above and then check to enable everything under “Grammar.” Click “OK” to save. Enable “Check spelling as you type,” “Use contextual spelling,” “Mark grammar errors as you type, and “Check grammar with spelling.” Set your writing style as “Grammar & Style.”Ĭlick on “Settings” to the right of “Grammar & Style” next to “Writing Style.” Set your options as above, particularly the highlighted items. Make sure the “Proofing” pane is selected from the left sidebar menu. This will open your list of options for MS Word Autochecking. This will start your spell-check as is, but what you want to do now is change your preferences.Ĭlick on the “Options” button highlighted above. To do so in MS Word, first click on the tab on the tool bar that says “Review,” then click on the “ABC Spelling and Grammar” button as shown below: To prepare it for submission, you will need to make some global formatting changes but never fear! You will not have to make them manually, one at a time, thanks to the fabulousness of MS Word and Open Office.įirst, if you have not already done so, change the settings in your word processing program to correct for spelling, grammar, and style. Go to your MS Word/Open Office document that contains your “final” version of your manuscript.
Other ebook publishers use pretty much the same formatting as KDP. Of course, there will initially be nothing there to see or manage until you begin your uploads. You can upload new books, change your cover or manuscript, and track your sales through this interface. After your account is complete, you will have a “bookshelf” where you will manage your submissions. Go to Kindle Direct Publishers ( and set up an account with them.
#FORMATTING FOR KINDLE DIRECT PUBLISHING HOW TO#
It took me a while to learn how to master their formatting, but that was a matter of time and practice, plus elimination of a little over-thinking on my part. I have personally never had a problem with KDP and have stuck with them faithfully with great results.
Yes, there is room for error, but if you search out KDP on the internet, you will find that there are relatively few complaints from authors when considered in relation to the literally tens of thousands of books they publish each year. Kindle Direct Publishers (KDP) is about as close to perfect as you can get in a publishing program. Formatting for a print book is a bit trickier and finding your feet with e-publishing first is a good option. Unless you specifically want or need a print version of your book, it can be a good idea to see how the book does in ebook form before taking it to print.
I highly recommend using Kindle Direct Publishers for your maiden voyage into publishing.
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