For today's episode, Becky Wright is back! Last time we talked about formatting, we got a little carried away. This time, we focussed on 5 quick and easy formatting tips you can apply to your book right now.
These are Becky's tips:
We didn't set an action step today because the whole episode is one big action step. If you're new to formatting or intimidated by it after failed previous attempts, give Becky's 5 Quick and Easy Tips a go!
Prefer to have the pros take formatting off your hands? You can find out more about or book Becky's business PlatformHouse Publishing for your project on their website.
________________________________________________________________________________
Come join The Writing Sparrow in its very own Facebook group!
To find out more about Sarina and her books, visit her website, find her on Twitter and on Facebook, or connect with her (and the podcast!) on Discord.
For today's episode, Becky Wright is back! Last time we talked about formatting, we got a little carried away. This time, we focussed on 5 quick and easy formatting tips you can apply to your book right now.
These are Becky's tips:
We didn't set an action step today because the whole episode is one big action step. If you're new to formatting or intimidated by it after failed previous attempts, give Becky's 5 Quick and Easy Tips a go!
Prefer to have the pros take formatting off your hands? You can find out more about or book Becky's business PlatformHouse Publishing for your project on their website.
________________________________________________________________________________
Come join The Writing Sparrow in its very own Facebook group!
To find out more about Sarina and her books, visit her website, find her on Twitter and on Facebook, or connect with her (and the podcast!) on Discord.
Hello, and welcome to the Writing Sparrow podcast. Im Sarina Langer, and this podcast is all about writing, publishing and marketing your book. You can find transcripts on my website t sarinalanger.com. Lets get s arted! Hello, and welcome back, sparrows and friends. It's the 30th of November, this is Episode 13, and Becky Wright is back. If you remember I did the first ever interview of this podcast with Becky about formatting and generally about her incredible business for writers, PlatformHouse Publishing, and we maybe got a little bit carried away. Sorry. I've asked her back so that we, meaning Becky, can give you some quick and easy tips you can use for your own book right now. Pronunciation on quick. But before we begin, I just wanted to quickly say a big thank you to all of you listening. I've had an email this week from Booksprout to congratulate me on my first 100 downloads. So, you guys, thank you so much, and how fitting is that for the return of my first ever interviewee, Becky! Welcome back, Becky.
Becky Wright:Hi, Sarina. It's good to be back. And I will stay on track today.
Sarina Langer:No, I will, I will try, but I think a bit off... Who doesn't love a bit of banter?
Becky Wright:Yeah it's just normal. It's a chat over a drink.
Sarina Langer:Yeah, we're already doing it. I don't think we can help ourselves.
Becky Wright:No! Right, right. Okay, on track.
Sarina Langer:Okay, what did I just say about doing this quick? So, today, um, as I've just said, I've asked you back to give our listeners a few quick and easy steps anyone can apply to format their own books right now that any of us can handle, even myself who really hates formatting and nearly lost her entire book because I pressed the wrong thing one time.
Becky Wright:Oh. Yeah.
Sarina Langer:Yeah. So, how many tips do you have for us today?
Becky Wright:I have five. Five really important... not one of them is more important than the other, but as a collective, they're all important. So these are all the top five that I think everybody needs to remember.
Sarina Langer:Fantastic. Okay, let's start with tip number one. What have you got?
Becky Wright:Tip Number One! I feel like I should have had like a countdown, sort of some sort of music tune there.
Right, tip number one:style. Make sure that you know what genre your book format needs to look like. So obviously, if it's a fantasy, you can have lots of embellishments and borders and really nice illustrations. And if it's something like a thriller or a horror or something like that, you're going to need to have plain or more strict on your illustrations. So I think, so I think style is, style is really important. And it's the first place you're going to need to start, so before you do anything else, you need to start on that.
Sarina Langer:See, I'm torn about that, because I really get what you're saying with that and I couldn't agree more that obviously style is so important. But I'm just having flashbacks to the first, to my first book ever when I tried to format that. And I think I just tried to even just move a sentence and suddenly everything had shifted, and my page numbers were suddenly gone, and I didn't know what had happened to the paragraphs. So the idea of me doing any kind of fancy style formatting is making me break out in cold sweat right now.
Becky Wright:I mean, I think get your general layout in and worry about the fancy fiddly bits later, because you need to get the basic template done. So think about the style, the style needs... you need to have that in the back of your mind, although you don't need to add anything at this point. You still need to think, what is it? What over- what sort of impression when you open that book, what are you looking for? What are you trying to portray for to the actual reader, because I think as much as your cover and your blurb, opening them pages that sets up the reader for knowing what they're going into. That's my top tip number one.
Sarina Langer:I think one thing that can possibly help with that if you're not quite sure what might work well for your genre is to maybe have a look at other books in the genre and see what they've done.
Becky Wright:Oh, absolutely that, I would always do that. And if before I have a new client with, before I start anybody's book, I will always look really in depth of what the genre is and go out and if it's something I haven't done, or a new client I haven't worked with, I'll go out and look, physically look on the interiors of books and have a look at formatting. So it's a must. It's a must. It's really important.
Sarina Langer:And I think this might be a good moment to say
Becky Wright:Yeah, that's always important to me. It's not that you have spent all week formatting my two books, and they are so beautiful! Honestly, I haven't, I've had quite a, quite a stressful week, but you know how it goes, I've been quite busy. So I still haven't been able to look through them properly. But from what I've seen, they're absolutely stunning. And I can't wait to have the proof copy in my hand so I can until you get that proof copy that you can actually see it for real. It's all very well looking at it on a screen, but until you've actually got it in your hands, and then you can really see how it works.
Sarina Langer:Absolutely. Or, you know, on your Kindle when we're talking about an ebook, but either way, you've done such a beautiful job. I can't wait for people to see it. And I can't wait to admire it some more at the weekend. All right, what's your second tip?
Becky Wright: Right. Second one:front and back matter.
Sarina Langer:Oh, yes.
Becky Wright:It matters. It does matter.
Sarina Langer:It does! I kind of forgot mine this time around.
Becky Wright:But it was fine, because I was like, no, we got something missing, but it's fine. The acknowledgement pages... So the front and the back matter, for anybody who's starting out and not quite- because you use that term sometimes and people don't understand what that is. And it just means your dedication, your copyright, your dedication, your acknowledgement, you're about the author, and the contents page, all them things. Some of them definitely belong at the front obviously, obviously, the copyright page and your dedication, and depending on your preference, some people put the acknowledgement at the back and About the Author is- I would always put the About the Author at the back. And it also depends on ebook and paperback. Because we know, or some people may not know that you, the less you put at the front of your ebook... So as soon as, as soon as the reader gets into the story, the better. Because you've got the links and they can find all the extra bits, it doesn't actually necessarily need to be in there, as long as the copyright and your dedication, anything that you need to have it in the front can go in, but anything that's surplus needs to be in the book but doesn't set up the story, put it at the back.
Sarina Langer:Completely agree. And again, I think a good thing, if you're not quite sure what to put for the front and back matter in your book is to pull off a book off your shelf right now, something in your genre and just see what they've done. You know, it doesn't need to be anything fancy, just--
Becky Wright:No, not at all. Not at all. So, I would always say pick two or three books off your bookshelf of different genres, and have a look at them all as an overall and then get a feel for what, where people put their pages. Not everybody has an About the Author page. If you're a big mainstream author, you might have a real famous author, and they probably won't have one or it may be just a paragraph on their back cover, cause they, they don't need one, everyone tends to know who they are, but for us, and it's important. And links in your ebook have to go to the right places, so you have links to all your social media and your website, and, and what other books that you've got. They need to be in there. I would- it depends on whether you put them at the front or the back. It's, you know, it's entirely up to you, depending on what it is. If it's a paperback, I would always put Books By, Other Books By, and Books By Me at the front.
Sarina Langer:Yeah, I mean, I think unlike with the style, and you know maybe even adding an images and little things like that, just adding, you know, things like your dedication, for example, or writing your acknowledgments usually takes a bit of thought and time to write it all out, but it's not a complicated thing to do, and you don't need to overthink it. Because especially for your acknowledgments, you already know what the process was like for you. You already know who you've worked with, who your beta readers were, so--
Becky Wright:And when you're trying to compose that, cause- Right, it's like, Oh my God, I've got to write a bio, I've got to write- and that closure page, where do I start? Start at the beginning of your writing process. Who was it, the first person that saw your book other than you, and literally work your way down. So do it as a checkpoint, and you can vary that to each book. So, as long as you've got the basis of your acknowledgement page, you can just tweak that to different books, and your About the Author page can stay exactly the same, and it literally just goes in every single book. You may want to tweak it depending on circumstances, obviously, and add an extra book at the end of it, your other books by you, and you can add an extra book in, but otherwise generally they're just templates and you can just add them in.
Sarina Langer:Exactly. I mean I know for my duology where the- well, actually by the time this interview goes live, my second book will already be out.
Becky Wright:Exciting!
Sarina Langer:But you know, in both of those, I have the same map, I have the same Pronunciation Guide. So don't think that you have to start over again from scratch, even with every book, you know, because there'll be some things that you can reuse over and over and over again, which will save you a lot of time and it will make it look all the more professional.
Becky Wright:Yep, absolutely. And it's like, copyright page--lots of people have it quite long, comprehensive copyright pages. Some people literally will just have the title, and just 'all rights reserved' and the copyright, you know, it's, it doesn't matter. I've always had quite a comprehensive one, because when I first started out, I found what I wanted, sorted my wording out, and so I just have the same one.
Sarina Langer:I think it's quite easy for us to panic when we hear the word copyright page, because it's something, it's legal stuff, you know, we need to make sure we get it right. But honestly, as long as you have the copyright symbol in there and your name and the year, you are covered. That's literally all you need.
Becky Wright:Yeah, copyright, copyright symbol, your name, I would always make sure, All Rights Reserved, and, and your website.
Sarina Langer:Yes, of course.
Becky Wright:As long as it really needs to be in there. And it is, it's one of those personal preferences, I think. Some people like to keep them simple. So the front and the back matter, and as much- and it matters, so it needs to be in there.
Sarina Langer:The front and the back matter matters. There you go. If that's not the catchy thing for you to remember, I don't know what is.
Becky Wright:It's a tongue twister, but yes, it does. So if you think it matters, it needs to be in there.
Sarina Langer:So, what is tip number three?
Becky Wright:Right, Tip Number three: font and chapter headings. Lots of people, and I did it in the early days, simple, simple font, and it would be one font throughout. And, and I think you don't need to... don't overdo it in the same respect, depending on your genre, depending on what the style you're going for. And this will lead on from you thinking hat style, what style your, his book is going to be, what tyle formatting. So, font. And I would, it's a, it's a p eference to me. I've chang d my preference over the years, I've gone from Times New Roman, and I'm now on Garamond at the minute, which is my favour te one personally. But there' a whole array of them. And th y're as long as they are easy r adable. And you can google his, you know, 'best fonts or fiction'. And there's so ma y, so many different websi es and blogs, and every hing that you can find that ill give you a guidance into here you need to go. And there was one, one, I would alway say: do not use Arial.
Sarina Langer:Oh, there you go. That's a pro tip. Why not, Becky?
Becky Wright:I think it's just not particularly easy reading and it won't look professional. And I think if you... and it's again, it's one of those, go on your bookshelf and get a load of books, half a dozen books, open them all up and see what they look like.
Sarina Langer:And chances are there'll be something very simple like Times New Roman, or Garamond as you've heard. I mean, if you're still not sure what to use, then those two you can't really go wrong with. That said, you can use something fancy, like something that looks a bit like handwriting if you have maybe like a short handwritten note in there. Or maybe--
Becky Wright:They are, they are really good. And if you've got like an article in the book, in storyline, perhaps it's a newspaper cutting, and it needs to be in there. You could use one of the newspaper fonts, something that looks like it's in print, in type. And that will just work because it will, it will make the reader realise that they are reading something like that within.
Sarina Langer:Yes. So some fonts like that are fantastic for small bits like that, but you don't want them throughout the entire book.
Becky Wright:No, and I think on your chapter headings it's important, it doesn't need... I would always say vary it for the chapter headings, even if you're going for something simple, a complimentary font, but never use more than three in your whole book. Otherwise, it's just going to be, it's just going to be a gallery of fonts and the readers won't know what, what it's looking, what they're looking at. So fonts, think about them seriously, and look at what other people have done in your genre. So you've picked the right sort of font.
Sarina Langer:All right, tip number four. What have you got?
Becky Wright: Tip Number Four:widows and orphans.
Sarina Langer:Oh! Oh, I can't tell you the headache I've got from this on my first book. You might remember: in our first interview, I said that I got this close to throwing my laptop out the window. This is why.
Becky Wright:Yeah, and it's a button. It's just a button.
Sarina Langer:Yeah, I didn't realise that. I literally-
Becky Wright:What it basically does, it keeps bodies of text together. So if you've got, if you've got a scene break and you're going into another body of text and it's a different scene, rather than having at the bottom of the page one lonesome widow, and all, all of the rest of it up on the top of the next page, or you've got everything, it goes right the way down and then you've got one lonesome little line at the top of the next page, and then you've got the gap. It's just, it's a formatting... it's having an eye for your formatting. So if it doesn't look quite right...
Sarina Langer:Chances are it isn't.
Becky Wright:So, and if you go into your... It's in your formatting settings in Word, in Microsoft Word, it's just a, a click. Click it, and it will do it for you.
Sarina Langer:Yes, I mean, the thing is that... I mean, we could sort of try to talk you through how to get there, but depending on what software you use, it will be different.
Becky Wright:Yeah, absolutely.
Sarina Langer:There are so many versions all the time, because it's technology and nothing lasts very long in this world. So if you're not sure where it is, or how to find it, just google it quickly.
Becky Wright:Yep. It'll be in the Help programme, whatever programme you're using. But it is important just to keep chapter sec- keep sections, scene sections together. So you don't have stray little lines going off into the, into the nevernever and everyone's like, what? So you didn't- And it's also looking over your, looking over your layout. And if it doesn't, if it looks right- My eye works that way. So it's, I know that's easy for me to say, but as long as it looks right.
Sarina Langer:Do you want to hear a story that will make you cringe?
Becky Wright:Go on.
Sarina Langer:Okay. So with my first book, I think at the time I was still using OpenOffice--and I mean, don't get me wrong, if OpenOffice is the programme for you, good for you. Personally, I have a very strong hate relationship with that thing now. So, so when with my first book, I for some reason... I think I'd read somewhere that you had to do all of your widows and orphans individually, and I just got it into my head that this is what I had to do. So I kid you not, I literally went through my entire book several times, doing all of them on a page per page basis, and then I eventually, I think I went downstairs afterwards, and I was so tired from just staring at it for honestly hours, and my partner went, you know you could just have select ed the whole document and done it literally with one click right? I was like, No, no, you can't, I'm sure I've read that you can't, I would have done it. I can't do it. It can't be that easy. And he did it. And oh, I'm still thinking about this now.
Becky Wright:That goes back to what we've had conversations with in the past, it's we are forever learning and it's a trial and error, and now it's not that you've, you found a way not to do it. That's what it is.
Sarina Langer:I think now looking back, that might just be why I started hating formatting so much. It's the widows and orphans.
Becky Wright:It's a common thing, this hatred for formatting. I've heard it many a time.
Sarina Langer:But you don't understand it, do you, cuz you
Becky Wright:I do love it. And it's handy, it is, because my love it. brain works that way. And I think... and I have. Yeah, I have, I have...
Arthur Wright:Hello!
Sarina Langer:Hi!
Becky Wright:... because I have this checklist... Oh, that's my son. Oh, he's a cheeky one. Um, but yeah, it is. All these things are important. But it's only because you want the overall thing to look, the overall book to look as it should. And as long as you have this checklist, and I work by this checklist, I mean, it's in my head. I don't think about it now. It's just automatic. So, um, but yeah, so that's tip number four. Widows and orphans.
Sarina Langer:I think the one thing for us all to take away from that, maybe, is that it looks complicated, or it did to me anyway, and it looks really intimidating, but it's literally just a matter of selecting your entire document and pressing a button. And then it's done. And it looks so much cleaner, and it's, it doesn't need to take the hours that I put into it with my first ever attempt. And honestly, it's as fast as 10 seconds and you're done with it. It's nothing to fear.
Becky Wright:That's it. No, it isn't. It is like you say, you just select all and you can just press a button, or press a button and put whole document and it, depending on what programme you're using, it is just a click of a button effectively. Maybe two or three clicks but it is.
Sarina Langer:Not me, that's for sure. Tip number five?
Becky Wright: Tip Number Five:your page numbers.
Sarina Langer:Oh yes. Again, such a headache for me.
Becky Wright:It's a biggie. And it is, it can be really tricky to get it right if you don't do it very often or if you're not quite sure. And it is one of those things that I did where I've muddled my way through and I've learned, but it is, it can be quite easy once you know what you're doing, and a lot of it is down to section breaks, your page breaks, and making sure you isolate it and follow it, lead it on to the next section. It sounds really complicated, but getting your page numbers correct is a must. I mean, the front and the back matter doesn't need page numbers on, so it's only the body of the story.
Sarina Langer:And that's the start of all the complications in that.
Becky Wright:In parts, yeah. And I think once, I mean for indie publishing generally, I think there's been times in our, in our industry where indie books have had a bad rep. And it's because very early to early days, and there are a very small selection of books that people come across, and if they're badly formatted or don't look professional, badly edited, they are going to stick out like a sore thumb. But generally across the board, us indie authors are no different than our, than a mainstream traditionally published author. It's just that we do the process ourselves.
Sarina Langer:Exactly.
Becky Wright:If you do the marketing right, they will sit on this bookshelf alongside all the mainstream publishers.
Sarina Langer:Well, exactly. And I mean, for me, the reason that I decided to be an indie author is that I just like the control over everything.
Becky Wright:Yeah, absolutely.
Sarina Langer:I mean, granted with the formatting, I handed the control entirely over to you, because I know that you know what you're doing, and you enjoy it. And I know, it'll come back looking stunning to me. But you know, if I didn't like something that you did, I would then have the freedom to say actually, Becky, this isn't working.
Becky Wright:Absolutely, and we'd try something else. Yeah, every time if I ever do anything and someone's not happy, ike the other day, you said, Oh, could we just tweak this? Yeah, that's not a problem. At the end of the day, it's your book. And when I first start formatting, I'm just doing an interpretation of how I think it will look. But at the end of the day it's your book baby. So if you're thinking, Oh, that's not quite how I imagined, can we do this? Of course we can. And we will keep doing it until you are 100% happy. Because it's not my book. It's yours. I'm just providing a service. That's all I'm doing.
Sarina Langer:And you're providing great service. My books are very pleased and so am I.
Becky Wright:Thank you.
Sarina Langer:Oh, has this been all five tips already?
Becky Wright:It has. They are the top five. There's other things we could have discussed, but I think if you get them five right, and take consideration into them five, generally, overall, you'll be doing a good job.
Sarina Langer:Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's a thing for most writers, when we hear the word formatting, there is something in us that starts panicking. I know I certainly do.
Becky Wright:And I think it's that word formatting, instantly--
Sarina Langer:It just fills us with dread, doesn't it? I mean, for some people it's the word editing. Or, and, you know, for some, it's rewriting. And for me, it's formatting. But it's not, it's not even that hard, though. That's the thing. And I Well, exactly. I mean, that's always how I argue. I could try
Becky Wright:I think people think it's going to be harder. think- You can get a really basic format and do it yourself. You to do it myself again, but Becky enjoys it, so I give it to need to go back and tweak it, and you may need to go back into it. And it's the, it's the time consuming part of it that people get frustrated with, it's because you're, no, it's gonna- I'm gonna take a whole day out because I've got to format this book. Because if you don't do it on a regular basis, it's going to take you a long time, and when you come across litt e issues you're thinking, Oh, m goodness, how do I get ove that? And then you think, okay I've got to just Google this And let me just ask somebody. S that's where the time consuming This is why I get the job, beca se I'm like, Well, okay, I can urn it around it really quic. And I love doing it. So I can et that done. Becky. And I turn it around really fast as well.
Sarina Langer:You do.
Becky Wright:Because you need it really quickly.
Sarina Langer:Yes. Sorry about that.
Becky Wright:No, it's fine! You are not alone. You are not alone. There's plenty there. And I'll get the email and I'll hear the urgency in the email. I'm just gonna get this to you. I'm now sorting this bit and this bit, and to me that says right, you need that back quickly.
Arthur Wright:Hi.
Sarina Langer:Hi!
Becky Wright:So yeah, really quickly, really quick turnaround.
Sarina Langer:And you know, I think with erm... Oh, what was I gonna say? Doesn't matter. Well, I- No, I've got it, I've got it. I think with, with now with the five tips that you've just shared, it'll make it a lot easier. And I would definitely urge everyone listening, if you haven't done it before, if you haven't tried it yet, just give it a go, see how you get on. Because you might actually find it really easy or even enjoy it somehow.
Becky Wright:Absolutely!
Sarina Langer:You know, so just try it. Try it at least once. You're an author, we both know you're adventurous and you want to give it a shot. So, just try it.
Becky Wright:That's it. And if they have any problem and you do get stuck, just hand it over to me, and then I'll finish it. I'll sort it out. I'll get there at the end. And we can sort it, and I do have a lot of people who will be halfway through or they've done it and I will just get, get it to do the tweaks. I've done all this, but could you put the page numbers in? I've done all this, but I'm having a problem with headers and footers. Oh, that's another one, but we're not going to go there today. But it's, and then people, then I get it, and then I just redo it, rejig it about and yeah. But there are lots of other things like we could have spoke about, but I will leave the uploading with bleed and all of those for another day.
Sarina Langer:Well, maybe one day next year, we can do another interview with your next five tips.
Becky Wright:Yes, yes.
Sarina Langer:And we can look into doing that.
Becky Wright:That's it. I mean there's plenty. There's so much.
Sarina Langer:But for today, thank you very much for coming by.
Becky Wright:Thank you!
Sarina Langer:And for talking to me once again about formatting. And I think you have done very well this time of keeping it on point.
Becky Wright:We did. We did. Brilliant.
Sarina Langer:Well, thank you very much.
Becky Wright:Thank you. Bye Bye.
Arthur Wright:I'm gonna miss you so much!
Sarina Langer:Oh, you too. Bye. If you enjoyed todays episode, maybe learn something along the way, hit the subscribe button. You can also connect with me on Twitter @sarina_langer, on Instagram and Facebook@sarinalangerwriter, and of course on my website at sarinalanger.com. Until next time! Bye!