In the past two years, I’ve posted quite a bit of my work on Amazon through their KDP program. That’s great. It really is. I won’t say I’ve been all that successful with it, but I have seen a modest number of sales here and there. Even better is the newer paperback option. I prefer physical books, and I truly love holding one bearing my name in my own two hands. That’s a wonderful feeling, probably the closest I’ll ever get to holding a child of my own.
Today, I had planned to release my novel Innocence Reborn in paperback. But I won’t. Why? Because I’m taking a break from KDP for a while. I don’t know if Innocence Reborn is ready for the platform, and it’s just too much trouble changing things around to fit their requirements. I’ve had no end of problems adjusting margins, for example, because LuaTeX (the engine I use to create print-ready PDFs) doesn’t play nice with whatever Amazon uses to measure. Thus, my “0.75 inch” margin—the minimum required for a book of the intended size—is somehow smaller than the “0.750000 inch” that they ask for.
On top of that, I have yet to get the print cover looking the way I want. In every case thus far (Before I Wake, Nocturne, The Linear Cycle, and The Shape of Things) the end result comes out too dark. Granted, I’ve used black backgrounds for three of those, and a dark red for The Linear Cycle, but…I’m no artist. I’m not a designer. I really don’t know what’s going on, nor do I know how to ask for help, let alone whether anyone would bother giving it.
This isn’t permanent. I fully intend to come back to the platform, but I really feel like I need a break from the hassle. Let me write. That’s all I ask. Then, once I’m done with the writing (and the editing, the re-editing, the re-re-editing…), I’ll worry about print-friendly cover art, half-title pages, and things like that.