# Bad Formatting in Kindle Books: List 'Em!



## CS (Nov 3, 2008)

I don't think we have a catch-all thread dedicated for this purpose. Something like this could be really useful.

I think we should list the book and a brief synopsis of formatting errors. If we list the nature of the errors, people can decide for themselves if the book is still worth reading despite them (for example, Promises in Death below).

I'll start us off with a couple off the top of my head.

*Ring of Hell:* Atrocious. Tons of combined words, some sentences are missing words or generally make no sense. Just a total mess. Never fixed (to my knowledge) despite repeated complaints to Amazon, the publishers, and even the author. The publishing company was clueless (they probably don't even have access to a Kindle) and the author never responded (way to show that you care about your work, bub).

*Promises in Death:* HUGE gaps between paragraphs. Some found this tolerable. I couldn't take it though.


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## drenee (Nov 11, 2008)

*The Tea Rose* Sentences were fragmented, part of a sentence would be on the line below inserted in the middle of the next sentence. The book got a bit worse towards the end.

*One For The Money*. No paragraph indentations. Not a huge problem, but sometimes I would have to go back and reread a couple of times to get the flow correct.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

Most books from Gutenberg, as Text files, are a mess when they come into the Kindle through your USB connection. However, using mobpocket, you can do some reformatting - or better still, most Gutenberg books are available at www.manybooks.com  in an AZW format.

Edward C. Patterson
author of stuff
www.dancaster.com


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

I find the formatting on books from feedbooks to be quite good as well. .  . .

Ann


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## Steph H (Oct 28, 2008)

edwpat said:


> most Gutenberg books are available at www.manybooks.com  in an AZW format.


Note that it's www.manybooks.net and not .com. 

I've actually found www.feedbooks.com to be a better source for those books, because the metadata is better so they show up right on the Kindle.

But that detracts from the purpose of this thread.  To get back on topic, I'll add:

*A Death at the North Pole* by Joel M. Andre, available on Amazon -- lots of errors with line spacing, dropped lines and quite a few spelling errors to boot. The formatting errors made me think of a badly-converted PDF document. (That said, it was still a fun story and only 99 cents!)


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## pidgeon92 (Oct 27, 2008)

I was thinking about starting this thread myself.... I mentioned this book in another thread, and this is a part of the review I put on Amazon:

*Sleep Toward Heaven*
At anything but the smallest font size, this book is almost unreadable. The last word on most lines drops to the next line, and is often the only word on that line.

Every so often the book title is listed in the body of the text, along with a number that I think is the page number. Sometimes it lists the author's name instead.

Wherever there is italicized text there is no space before the first letter of the first italicized word, or the last letter of the last italicized word, so words run together.

Where the sections break into the different women's characters, the first letter of the section is isolated above the first paragraph.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

When poorly formatted books appear, do you report these problems to the author or the publisher? These items are easily corrected (formatting for the Kindle ain't rocket-science), and most autor's are contactable through their profiles. Author's who do not have their electronic rights have no control over their ebook's formats or toerhwise. But if they know that their book is being perceived as illegible, they can squawk to the rights holder to effect changes.

Ed Patterson


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## pidgeon92 (Oct 27, 2008)

I sent my feedback directly to Amazon, they replied that they would look into it.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

Pidgeon93:

I'm afraid that Amazon will probably do nothng, because DTP (Digital Text Platform) is self-supporting. They don't even support the authors and publishers who publish on the Kindle. The best route is via the author (who may not even have a Kindle to see what's going on and is blissfully ignorant that there's a problem). I wish I could give you a statistic on how many authors do not own a Kindle, but I'd be flying blind. BUT I'd say that, of the authors I know, and I have over a hundred in my friends list, I'd say a little less than half own a Kindle, and rely on the rest of us to tell them if there's formatting issues. Thankfully, reediting and uploading a new Kindle version is easy and seamless. At one time, reader's could redownload corrected copies or reedited copies, but Amazon discontinued that - but at least new readers of an author's work would get the benefit of old reader's (you now what I mean) feedback and download better or corrected formatting and edited copies. It's funny: Amazon's Kindle customer support is superlative IMHO, but they provide no suppot for the authors ad publishers that's worth a damn. Fortunately, an extra-structure of helpful hands like KreelanWarrior, and WheelmanPress, and Leslie N. (a moderator here) and little ole ME, try when we can and have published helpful materials for both readers and authors.

Thanks
Edward C. Patterson
a o s (author of stuff)


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## pidgeon92 (Oct 27, 2008)

edwpat said:


> Pidgeon93:
> 
> I'm afraid that Amazon will probably do nothng, because DTP (Digital Text Platform) is self-supporting.


I don't think this is quite true.... Amazon has pulled several Kindle books due to poor formatting; we've had many posts about it on this board, The Stand being the one that is cited most often.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

Not quite true, but not quite false. The Stand, for example is by a branded author and is firmly within King's rights since the 1990's when it he reacquired them. King is also working closely with Amazon's marketing team - so any complaint(s) about a poorly formatted, copyrighted book by Stephen King would get Amazon's immediate attention. If you were to report my novel Cutting the Cheese, my first Kindle book, which had some learning curve formatting issues, to Amazon, they would have sent you the form letter and that would have been the end of it. Fortunately, I was a Kindle owner and fellow authors also found these errors. A new copy of Cutting the Cheese was mounted and re-issued within 2 weeks of the original issue. Whew! (Both in paper and on the Kindle - I use CreateSpace - which is also Amazon owned). Of course, Cutting the Cheese had 5 sales in its first 2 months of existance. Now I average over a hundred book sales monthly, and perhaps you're right - Amazon might react differently now, although my year and a half of Kindle selling is still a calm ripple on the Sea Amazonic. lol

Ed Patterson


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## WalterK (Mar 2, 2009)

There are formatting errors where the worksheets extend beyond the right margin. This only occurs in two or possibly three short sections of the book and everything else is rendered correctly; so IMHO - not a big deal on this title.

- Walter...


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## Neekeebee (Jan 10, 2009)

Great thread idea, CS!
*
Private by Kate Brian* had lots of typos. It looked like it was scanned from a random paperback copy, b/c there would often be typos like "n" substituted for "ri" or "m" substituted for "in". I got it back when it was free, though; maybe Amazon has since corrected the errors.

- Paragraphs are not indented. Setting the Kindle on Full justification helps, but doesn't take care of the problem completely. The sample I got of the next book in the series has the same problem.

N


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## MonaSW (Nov 16, 2008)

CS said:


> *Promises in Death:* HUGE gaps between paragraphs. Some found this tolerable. I couldn't take it though.


The latest Dresden files book, Turn Coat, has this same problem. It also had some other problems (repeated partial sentences for instance). I reported the problems to Amazon, said I did not want a refund because I intended to keep the book, just wanted to be able to get a corrected version when it was available. They gave me a $5 credit!

Hopefully they will get it fixed soon, I was disappointed in the quality of the editing.


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## TM (Nov 25, 2008)

Neekeebee said:


> Great thread idea, CS!
> *
> Private by Kate Brian* had lots of typos. It looked like it was scanned from a random paperback copy, b/c there would often be typos like "n" substituted for "ri" or "m" substituted for "in". I got it back when it was free, though; maybe Amazon has since corrected the errors.
> 
> ...


If I rember correctly, all of his books are that way. They also have other minor errors.


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## MikeD (Nov 5, 2008)

MonaSW said:


> The latest Dresden files book, Turn Coat, has this same problem. It also had some other problems (repeated partial sentences for instance). I reported the problems to Amazon, said I did not want a refund because I intended to keep the book, just wanted to be able to get a corrected version when it was available. They gave me a $5 credit!
> 
> Hopefully they will get it fixed soon, I was disappointed in the quality of the editing.


This is true of many of the recent ROC Book publications. It is true of these as well:


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## JimJ (Mar 3, 2009)

The Local News by Miriam Gershow has some problems with words running together but it doesn't happen often (I just went and skimmed through a few pages and didn't see any, but I know I remember quite a few instances). Also, when I got the sample, the chapters were labeled wrong. Chapter one was blank and the text for chapter one appeared under chapter two. I almost didn't buy it because of this but I did and it was fixed in the purchased version. The few problems there were was made up for by the fact that the book is excellent.


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## WilliamM (Feb 10, 2009)

Ghost Brigades: really bad pararaphing and an overabundance of triple spaces

Lost City Of Z - hyphen crazy


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

For authors out there formatting blindly for the Kindle, triple spaces come about because of an extra carriage return. Every carriage return is converted into 2 spaces when converted, so if you double carriage return, you will have a triple space.

Also, abandon the "tab" function in your manuscripts. Tab produce funny indents, errant breaks etc. Use your indents from styles, and your spacing also. The conversion from word to Kindle's AZW is intelligent enough to recognize the style formatting. Better still, convert your manuscripts to mobipocket's PRC format (which is AZW without the DRM). In this way you can see whether your formatting is clean. If you don't perform these conversions but leave it to the electronic rights holder, let them know this. Eventhough the formatting fault can be blamed on the rights holder, ultimately your name is on the cover.

Edward C. Patterson
learning by tests of fire


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## RoseHawke (Feb 5, 2009)

Happily I haven't run into too many of these, but just got another one (hence searching for a thread and coming up with this one.)

*Bone Crossed* - Patricia Briggs Has many extra lines between paragraphs. I reported it back in February and to the best of my knowledge it has never been fixed.










And the one I just downloaded yesterday, *Something Rotten* by Jasper Fford. Same Problem, I just reported it, not that it'll do any good.


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

RoseHawke said:


> Happily I haven't run into too many of these, but just got another one (hence searching for a thread and coming up with this one.)
> 
> *Bone Crossed* - Patricia Briggs Has many extra lines between paragraphs. I reported it back in February and to the best of my knowledge it has never been fixed.


That's the one I find the most. The other is no paragraph indents.

My suggestion is to write directly to the author. Too many reviews citing bad formatting will cut into sales.


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## Geemont (Nov 18, 2008)

I know some people are tolerate bad formatting, but I think it makes the book difficult to read, and that it is a good cause to yank the book from sale. Kindle editions of books need the same care, attention, and quality as printed books. If I were to see the same kind of errors on the self at Borders, there is no way I'd buy the book. So where do we complain to Amazon?

Extra two or lines between paragraphs:



No indentation for paragraphs:



Double indentation for paragraphs:


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

Personally, double indentation or extra space between paragraphs (as long as consistently done and not randomly variable) doesn't bother me as much as no paragraph indentation. I'm finding Uncubicled slow going because of the lack of paragraph indents.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

These are such easy things to correct, I don't know why authors don't catch them up front. I won't go into another technical explanation, but styles are our friends, and mobipocket conversion is free. The only thing that irks me (as both reader and author) is the change in the updating policy at Amazon, where corrected copies are not downloaded (upon request) to replace previous copies. That Day One feature was such a boon. Of course, if we catch the error before hand, it's a bit obnoxious to blame Amazon for changing a feature. They weren't thinking of careless formatting by authors when they reverse that policy. This is why authors need to strive to "brand" themselves, so readers have confidence in what they're getting, both in quality and style. Also, once an author strives toward branding, it enforces a natural quality standard that the author must achieve before the work can be called "publishable." It's a responsibility we have for our readership.

Soap box away
Edward C. Patterson


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## freedotift (May 12, 2009)

Infinity Blues by Ryan Adams.  TINY print.


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

Ann in Arlington said:


> Personally, double indentation or extra space between paragraphs (as long as consistently done and not randomly variable) doesn't bother me as much as no paragraph indentation. I'm finding Uncubicled slow going because of the lack of paragraph indents.


I would rather have double indentation than none. One extra space between paragraphs is fine, but several sometimes leaves only half a dozen lines on a page. That's annoying.


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## Neekeebee (Jan 10, 2009)

TM said:


> If I rember correctly, all of his books are that way. They also have other minor errors.


The sample for his third book (second in Mitch Rapp series)  seems to have proper paragraph indentations. I'm hoping the problem has been fixed now.

N


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## knowldgfrk (May 14, 2009)

since im a kindle virgin i dont know much yet...though my DarkGold has a few errors as well...same as you all are describing...though i figure it out i have looked at my Kindle like she was on crack  for some of the sentences and words!!


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## CS (Nov 3, 2008)

CS said:


> *Promises in Death:* HUGE gaps between paragraphs. Some found this tolerable. I couldn't take it though.


Does anyone know if they ever fixed this?


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## MikeD (Nov 5, 2008)

Gertie Kindle 'Turn to Page 390' said:


> I would rather have double indentation than none. One extra space between paragraphs is fine, but several sometimes leaves only half a dozen lines on a page. That's annoying.


Indeed. I only had 28 words on one page (standard font) in Mean Streets.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

Sounds like a standard Eye-Chart.  

Couldn't resist.

Ed Patterson


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## LauraB (Nov 23, 2008)

edwpat said:


> Not quite true, but not quite false. The Stand, for example is by a branded author and is firmly within King's rights since the 1990's when it he reacquired them. King is also working closely with Amazon's marketing team - so any complaint(s) about a poorly formatted, copyrighted book by Stephen King would get Amazon's immediate attention. If you were to report my novel Cutting the Cheese, my first Kindle book, which had some learning curve formatting issues, to Amazon, they would have sent you the form letter and that would have been the end of it. Fortunately, I was a Kindle owner and fellow authors also found these errors. A new copy of Cutting the Cheese was mounted and re-issued within 2 weeks of the original issue. Whew! (Both in paper and on the Kindle - I use CreateSpace - which is also Amazon owned). Of course, Cutting the Cheese had 5 sales in its first 2 months of existance. Now I average over a hundred book sales monthly, and perhaps you're right - Amazon might react differently now, although my year and a half of Kindle selling is still a calm ripple on the Sea Amazonic. lol
> 
> Ed Patterson


I've contacted Amazon about bad formatting on many, many (to many) books, and they have always pulled them. And I've never been blown off or sent a form letter response. Of course I always call, I don't email in format issues. I do contact Kindle Support via email for other stuff, but not format issues because it is to detailed a problem for a computer sorted email system. They always refund my money immediately, and deal with the book format, it has sometimes taken a few days, but they have always done so. I have no idea if they contacted the authors or not. Some of the books have been re-released, but I haven't bought them, because by then I have either bought the dtb or buy it on my Sony because I wanted to read it.


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## Gertie Kindle (Nov 6, 2008)

I'm reading Plum #13.  I never noticed any formatting problems with the other books in the series, but there are several in this one.  Several words are hyphenated in the middle of a sentence.  How about ... con ven ient.  Spaces for no reason.  

It's not bad enough for me to worry about.


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

Figured I'd add a link here to my related comment in the _Dune_ thread.


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## Neekeebee (Jan 10, 2009)

Great price. Good story. Terrible formatting. No paragraph indentations, often paragraphs run together so you can't even tell it's another character speaking, weirdo scanning that turns "his" into "bis" and "I'll" into "Ul", etc. and no page break between chapters.

N


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## pray4par (Apr 15, 2009)

Digital Fortress by Dan Brown has a lot of formatting errors.  In some spots, the text is really tough to read.


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## Mom of 4 (Oct 27, 2008)

The Terry Brooks novel "Magic Kingdom for Sale--Sold" (free right now) has quite a few errors.
All "!" are upsidedown, some words are hyphenated in the middle of a line, and some letters are swapped out.


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## HollyChristine (May 30, 2009)

This thread is very helpful for authors! I'm a writer, but I think I'm gradually getting better with formatting (some OCD comes into play here). If anyone had any issues with my book, I'd certainly want to know so that I could fix it!


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## David J. Guyton (Jan 6, 2009)

One of my readers was kind enough to give me a 3 star review based on the formatting of my novel. He/she even said the story was good but there were problems with formatting.

I have asked others (since I don't own a Kindle) for feedback on formatting and have heard that it is fine...nothing too bad.

I feel I should say I think it's unfair to "review" a book based on formatting. We (authors and publishers) do what amazon DTP tells us to do, and sometimes things get quirky. We fix what we can. Please don't post reviews based on formatting...if it bothers you, contact the author or publisher. Many times we are unaware. Heck, you might get a free paperback out of the deal for your trouble.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

David, I haven't gotten to your book yet - it's in my TBR stack. If I get a chance I'll sweep through it to see if there's serious formatting issues. Of course, needless to say, getting a review on something other than content, is tough, but whatever you do, don't respond to it, except if the formatting is a valid comment (then making fixes are in order). Commenting on a three star (good) review, actually any review, is a Bozo no, no. We say thank you for the good ones, but remain silent on the rest. It's just one of those middle of the night cramps we get that readers are not supposed to know about.

Edward C. Patterson


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## David J. Guyton (Jan 6, 2009)

Ed,

I know, I don't bother to respond to reviews, even the good ones....at least not on amazon. if I can find the person's email address, I will write a private thank you, but I leave the whole amazon deal to the readers alone.

Boy I have been tempted though!


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## MikeD (Nov 5, 2008)

David J. Guyton said:


> One of my readers was kind enough to give me a 3 star review based on the formatting of my novel. He/she even said the story was good but there were problems with formatting.
> 
> I have asked others (since I don't own a Kindle) for feedback on formatting and have heard that it is fine...nothing too bad.
> 
> I feel I should say I think it's unfair to "review" a book based on formatting. We (authors and publishers) do what amazon DTP tells us to do, and sometimes things get quirky. We fix what we can. Please don't post reviews based on formatting...if it bothers you, contact the author or publisher. Many times we are unaware. Heck, you might get a free paperback out of the deal for your trouble.


Sorry, but I strongly disagree with your premise. When a buyer purchases a book they buy the message AND the medium. I think it is altogether fair to criticize the medium in a review since it is part of what we consumers pay for.

And, no offense intended, but I don't buy the "sometimes things get quirky. We fix what we can." argument. In almost every job or profession attention to detail is paramount. Knowing what formatting problems exist BEFORE publishing is as easy as a final read through of the product before it is given to the public to buy. When the publisher fails to do this, or fails to follow up with the needed repairs,the publisher is failing to provide the consumer what he/she is paying for.

The author should be demanding that the publisher make sure that the medium is correct before it goes out for sale, not complaining about those who have been sold a lesser product and make their concerns known.

Now this is not a condemnation of your book. I haven't read it. It is a general statement and a general disagreement with your premise that reviewers should not review based on the medium. If the reviewer buys the medium and it affects his/her ability to enjoy the product, then by all means it should be a part of the review.

JMO.


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## MikeD (Nov 5, 2008)

One other point -

I think some people may confuse an Amazon review with a typical literary review. IMHO, a literary review is about the content while an Amazon review is about the product.

People who review Amazon products, books included, are simply letting other consumers know what is good and bad about the product that they are about to spend their money on. It isn't the same as a literary review. At Amazon, people review lawnmowers, groceries, sporting goods and more. And, yes, even books. It is hard to do a literary review on a lawnmower and the same exact process is used by Amazon consumers to review both the lawnmower and the book - the product as a whole.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

Mike D:

You are 1000% correct. Indie Authors especially need to work twice as hard since we generally work with an editor of our own choosing and no publishing house but ourselves. Just because we are Independents doesn't mean the professional tasks disappear. They are there, expected and part of the finished product. 

Edward C. Patterson


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## Geemont (Nov 18, 2008)

David J. Guyton said:


> Please don't post reviews based on formatting...if it bothers you, contact the author or publisher. Many times we are unaware.


Like a few other people, I think bad formatting is an issue were an author or publisher can be stung with a bad review. After all, if I bought a paperback book with the same kind of formatting errors found in ebooks, then I'd be perfectly justified in criticizing the author or publisher for a bad product.

Last year I downloaded a sample of a book from an author who posts here, it may have been your book but I can't remember for sure, and there were some formatting problems; not real, real bad, but noticeable enough that I was intending to make a comment in a thread about it, but never did. It was also the deciding factor in not buying the book which was going for only $0.99 at the time.

If I had bought the book and had been unable to finish reading because of the bad formatting, then I would have felt justified in leaving a poor review like "The novel might have been good if I'd been able to finish it, but the poor formatting made it essentially unreadible." 1 star.


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## CS (Nov 3, 2008)

Yep, bad formatting is a legitimate gripe and I cannot agree with the suggestion that readers shouldn't hold that against a Kindle book.

I'm sympathetic to the difficulties of Amazon's DTP, but there must be a way to get a book that doesn't have formatting issues - after all, others have done it.


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## Kevis Hendrickson (Feb 28, 2009)

I agree with the posters who say that the formatting is part of the overall review of the final product. However, some things are out of the author's control. When I released my first Kindle book a few months ago, I paid my publisher to prepare my book for Kindle. Unfortunately they released a very shoddy version. I don't have a Kindle so it's tough to be 100% sure of what the final product looks like. But as soon as I learned from readers that my publisher mishandled my book, I took them to task. They quickly apologized for the bad job they did and told me that they were having problems adjusting to Amazon's DTP format. After I put their feet to the fire, they finally fixed my book and got it into superb shape. Sadly, there are a few readers who are stuck with the old version of my book. This is where I really wish Amazon would allow Kindle owners to download the updated version of the books they purchase. It would make things so much easier on authors and readers alike, especially since we are dealing with new technology that is far from perfect.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

I am a believer that Indie Authors who publish for the Kindle should either buy one or borrow one and do their last edits on the Kindle. By converting the book to mobipocket formating (PRC) and spending $ .15 to send the book to the Kindle, an author can micromanage changes needed before uploading. I fully sympathize with author who balk at the price, but imagine an auto manufacturing guessing at what the final product is. (Well, perhaps a bad example, because I sometimes think auto manufacturers DO guess). If we share with the fish in the sea we must swim with the fish in the sea. Or, expect a bad formatting comment in a review. BTW, I am reading The Cambridge History of China Part V: The Sung Dynasty, a 1000 page non-fiction, researches tome. I have found a dozen formatting and typos in the book. Well, for the scholar and egghead - who cares. Whould I recommend the book - yep, I would. It's wonderful, but I would take it down a star. The book has been 20 years in the making and I waited a long time for it, but for $180, I expect perfection.

Edward C. Patterson
Not perfect, but trying


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## LauraB (Nov 23, 2008)

David, I do understand your point. I review many Kindle books, and I include formatting, both positive and negative, in my review because it is a necessary part of the product.  It is just the form of digital.  If it is difficult to read because of formatting it affects the book.  I agree with Mike, Amazon reviews are amateur reviews about the product, some people really do a literary job, but most are written, and read, because people want a consumers opinion of the product. The fact it is a book, is just a technicality. I try to understand how hard that must be for an author.  But, authors probably need to get literary feedback from professionals. And accept every day reader feedback for what it is usually meant,  honest feedback from their experience with the book.  If you want to publish in kindle format, and you want good reviews on Amazon on Kindle books, my advice is to 1) buy a Kindle  or 2) contact someone who has one, that you trust, send them a formatted copy of your book, ask them for feedback and then publish.  I've done this for people, and I know others who have, it really isn't that difficult. And as many friends as you have here, I would think you'd get a lot of takers. Just my unasked for thoughts.


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## LauraB (Nov 23, 2008)

Kevin, you could go to the product page of your book and make a comment on a review, or on  the product page that a corrected version has been released. Anyone who bought it could then call Amazon, get the old one removed, credited, and then repurchase.  Or a least it worked that way last time I tried to get a "fixed" version of a bad book I'd purchased.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

Red, I did that with my first book out there. The formatting was not up to par (this was back in December 2007, and before I had a Kindle, which was on backlog until mid-December). When I received emails from a few authors who were reading it and got a review that mentioned formatting, I panicked. However, back in the early days of the Kindle 1 (Jurassic), Amazon automatically replaced updated versions when re-requested through whispernet. (No longer). So, when the corrections were made, I contacted the readers to refresh. (I reissued the POD DTB and mailed new copies to readers). While I did this, I made a comment on the Reviews. After the replacement went forth, the reviewers edited their reviews and showed their approval of the reformatted book. Fortunately, this was my first book (actually a crucial book to have correct formatting), and I hadn't sold many so there was a control factor. Those were the days when one sale a week meant "Party time." It is essential that authors publish quality goods. I receive many professional reader reviews, but I will not launch a book unless it's been read by my professional friends (editors, agents and fellow authors).


Spoiler



My eighth published book, The Jade Owl


 was in beta-reading test for over a year. To ignore all the quality issues on a book, is to doom it to failure. You learn by experience, but it is also common sense. A reader may not like your book, but it should be because they find the material disagreeable or the genre not to their taste. It should never be for a lack of trying, or for poor or flat writing or bad characterization. And never for bad formatting. I find that even a reader who ultimately dislikes a book should still come away with the feeling that they have read superlative writing.

Edward C. Patterson


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## MikeD (Nov 5, 2008)

edwpat said:


> ...After the replacement went forth, the reviewers edited their reviews and showed their approval of the reformatted book....


And this is our responsibility as Amazon reviewers. When the problem has been fixed, we need to delete or modify our review. Failure to do this is not responsible reviewing on the part of the consumer. We have responsibilities as well, IMHO.


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## LauraB (Nov 23, 2008)

edwpat, yes, I've had the Kindle since DEC/Jan o7.  I remember when they used to just send the customer the updated version. Those were the days, huh   .  I do go back to the reviews I've done and check for comments, hoping that an author will post a comment about updated versions, so I can check them out. Because I do update and edit my reviews. Unfortunately, there isn't a very formal system.  So, I just hope authors will feel welcome to comment or email me.  My email in on my Amazon profile page, and surprisingly I get very little spam.


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## pidgeon92 (Oct 27, 2008)

MikeD said:


> And this is our responsibility as Amazon reviewers. When the problem has been fixed, we need to delete or modify our review. Failure to do this is not responsible reviewing on the part of the consumer. We have responsibilities as well, IMHO.


This is a tough one.... I've read a few poorly formatted books, and I would have to keep a list of the ones I reviewed and go back and have a look later... And what about the books where you cannot download the updated copy, as has happened to many members? There is no way to verify that everything has been repaired.


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## Edward C. Patterson (Mar 28, 2009)

pidgeon92 said:


> And what about the books where you cannot download the updated copy, as has happened to many members? There is no way to verify that everything has been repaired.


All the more reason for author diligence, either as the producer or getting on their publisher's


Spoiler



ass


. 

Edward C. Patterson


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