Editing ReKindled

I'm a traditionalist when it comes to editing in that I still use a red pen on paper.  Although I'm not traditional enough to use a quill on parchment.  It's just a cheap ballpoint pen from Staples on laser printer paper.

Though in recent years I adopted a more modern tactic of setting up a blog for the story as I write it.  Then when I'm slacking at work I read over what I've written and make notes to myself.  Then later after the story is done, I copy all that stuff into a Word file and make the changes to the story.  Incidentally that's why it used to look like I had 50 blogs, though now I've got it so only the important ones show up on my profile.

I still do the red pen editing after that because there's always stuff you might miss on the screen that will show up later on the paper.  Plus it's easier reading off paper than a screen for all those hours.

Recently though after I got my Kindle I added a new step.  Since the stories are probably going to be uploaded to Kindle anyway, I started converting them to read on my Kindle!

My new editing tool!

To do that I downloaded a little program called Auto Kindle Converter from Download.com.  The program has no real interface and it only does the one thing:  convert stuff into .MOBI files that can be read off the Kindle.  It works best if you save the file from a Word DOC into an HTML file.  Then it's pretty easy to just upload the file through the USB to the Documents folder in the Kindle.

From there I can read the story in the Kindle.  If I find something wrong, I can tag it with a Note and then refer back to that later.  Typing the notes is a little cumbersome, but if you text message a lot it's probably easier.  Later I can go through the Notes and make changes to the Word file.  Plus I can see (in theory at least) how the story will look on the Kindle.

I've found formatting the files for Kindle not to be all that hard, as long as you don't want to get too fancy.  I just referred to the Smashwords formatting guide, though I didn't use all their steps.  Mostly you just need to delete the Tabs and set it so the first line indents at say .33".  Or you can use .5" if you want.  That way you don't get uneven tabs so the thing looks better.  Plus put the story into single space.  You can probably fiddle with the fonts and stuff if you want.  I just use Times New Roman and it shows up fine on my Kindle, so screw it.  (Again, this is so easy it makes me wonder why publishers charge $15 for an eBook.)

The thing is, I still do the other steps I mentioned first.  Editing on the Kindle should really be the last thing I do.  Because it is a little more cumbersome to type notes and go back through them, so it's better to shake out most of the bugs on paper first.  Though it's a lot easier to carry the Kindle around than a stack of 400-500 pages.  Plus you don't have to worry about pages getting blown away or coffee spilled on them or something.

Or I could be like some people and just not edit it at all, but I'm kind of anal retentive about that stuff.  So there.