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There are many options out there for ebook writing software - but which ones are worth it? We review the top 10 options.
Monica Dube|
The age of handwriting your ebook and typing it up later is long gone. While I am a lover of beautiful stationery, ebook writing software can be much more useful.
It's easy to create beautiful books with Vellum than using book templates like the ones I used to use in this video. Video look of the Create Space book template available for Amazon self. How to Format an ebook for Kindle Self-Publishing With Microsoft Word - In Less Than 10 Mins - Duration: 10:51. Sean Dollwet - Self-Publishing & Passive Income 2,956 views 10:51. The Author's Guide to Vellum: Creating Beautiful Books with Vellum 2.0 - Kindle edition by Heintzelman, Chuck. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading The Author's Guide to Vellum: Creating Beautiful Books with Vellum 2.0.
“ Vellum creates beautiful ebooks and print books in mere seconds. It also makes it easy to update back matter in older titles whenever a new book comes out. Flexible and actually fun to use, Vellum is a dream program for writers who would rather concentrate on writing, not formatting. ” Learn more about James Scott Bell. Available on: Amazon. As you do so, Vellum applies your selection to every chapter (even if you add new ones). Use Vellum’s Preview to see how your ebook will appear on a range of devices, and to see how your book will look in print. The Preview updates instantly and with every edit.
In our selection, we review the best editing, writing, dictation, and converting tools. Some of them take you from the first good idea to the virtual bookshelf. Others import your manuscript and transform it into a beautiful ebook. Of course, everyone knows Blurb, and we write a lot about Sigil. If you need your manuscript converted to an epub, PublishDrive can do it for you: simply save it as a .docx file, and drag & drop it to the “Content file” field.
So let's see all the other software out there that help write and publish, and even promote your ebook.
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Contents
1. | Dictation tools |
2. | Ebook writing software |
(The article was updated on July 16, 2018.)
Dictation Tools for Writing an Ebook
When it comes to writing software, most writers still swear by Scrivener. We already have an article on what we liked and didn’t like about it. But writing a book is the hardest part. You’ll have to sit at the front of the computer for hours at a time. It is slow and needs your full, undivided attention. Thankfully, there is a way around it.
More and more professional writers decide to dictate their books. There are several software solutions able to do the job for you. This saves you from getting repetitive pain injury by the time you reach page 50, even if you can’t afford a secretary. Dictating your novel can be a great way to speed up the writing process and let your thoughts go relatively free. What is the best dictation software to use?
Google Docs Voice Typing
To use Google Docs voice input you have to open Google Docs with a Chrome browser, click ‘Tools’ and select ‘Voice typing.’ (Or use the shortcut cmd+shift+f on Mac / ctrl+shift+s on Windows.) You’ll have to allow the browser to use your microphone.
There are also around 100 commands you can give the app. Check out this help center for a comprehensive list. Dictation works in around 80 languages and regional accents in total, even in Hungarian! Voice commands, however, only work in English, and only if both the account’s language and the document are in English.
You can also use voice typing on any Android or iOS device with the GBoard (Google’s very own keyboard): I have never used GBoard to dictate anything longer than a note or text message, but it works just fine.
Pros | contact your local ISBN agency for pricing |
Cons | 99 USD at CreateSpace |
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Dictation on iPhone, iPad, and Mac
To turn on dictation on your iPhone, just open ‘Settings.’ Depending on your iOS version, look for ‘Keyboard’ or ‘Language and input’ to find ‘Dictation’ and switch it on. Once it is on, you will see the little microphone next to the keyboard. Just tap it to start dictating!
The transcription of your voice is done on a remote server, so you’re better off if you dictate in 30 seconds long segments. This is something I’ll probably need to get used to. Use a good mic (such as an iPhone’s noise-canceling mic you use for calls). If your Apple gadget doesn’t understand you, keep trying. With time, it gets better at recognizing your accent.
You can also use Apple’s dictation on a Mac computer. Go to ‘System Preferences’ and turn on ‘Dictation and Speech.’ (Depending on your iOS version, it could also be under ‘Keyboard.’) If you enable ‘enhanced dictation,’ your iOS will download a language package of around 400 MB, but it speeds up the recognition time and enhances accuracy.
Pricing | Free |
Languages | 40 languages and dialects |
Dragon and Dragon anywhere
Dragon is available for Mac, Windows, and phones (Dragon Anywhere). It is the best app currently out by all accounts – but it comes at a price. Dragon for Windows and Mac starts at 300$ and offers no trial version. You do have 30 days to ask for your money back.
The app version offers a trial period of a week; then it is 15$ a month or 150$ a year. You’ll have to sign up online then download the app and log in. (If you don’t like it, don’t forget to cancel your subscription after the end of the trial period.) For this price, Dragon offers 99% accuracy, custom words, and brilliant and intuitive editing options. Just watch this demo:
Pros | 15$ / month |
Cons | 11 languages, including English, French, German, and Japanese |
Ebook writing software
Reedsy Book Editor
- Pricing: free
- Platform: cloud
- Output formats: epub, mobi, PDF
For a WYSIWYG ebook editor that converts into a valid epub, we recommend Reedsy’s editor. Reedsy’s aim was to create an online marketplace where writers and publishing professionals can find each other. Their platform offers great collaboration opportunities without the usual pain of following up version numbers and more. With this ethos, their publishing platform is cloud-based: you can either write your whole book there or copy and paste it in once you are finished.
Just sign up with your social media account Facebook or Google to create your first ebook title. My favorite feature is the automated front matter with an auto-generated copyright page. You can, as expected, add pictures and notes. On the downside, the customizing options are insufficient.
Pros | Valid epubs. Free and simple. |
Cons | Maybe too simple? |
Vellum
- Pricing: free to download, $199.99 to export books
- Platform: macOS
- Output formats: mobi, epub, PDF
Created with usability and elegance in mind, Vellum is a fantastic software for creating Apple-, Kobo- and Amazon-approved ebooks and POD books. While there are other, much cheaper software solutions to do this for you, some of them even listed in this guide, Vellum is unique. It creates not only professional but beautiful text-centric ebooks. If your goal is to create a book as elegant as a Penguin edition, Vellum can be your choice. The creators took care of everything. It’s simple to use and efficiently imports from Word.
Pros | Beautiful, valid epubs. |
Cons | It is a bit pricey. |
(Source: The Write Life)
Creatavist
- Pricing: free to $200 per month
- Platform: cloud
- Output formats: web, Facebook stories, several ebook formats
Their motto is ‘create once, publish everywhere’ (COPE). Just sign up with Facebook and decide whether to publish under your name or create a profile for your publishing house. You can use Creatavist to write and edit your books and stories, add pictures and audio, and publish it on the web or download it as an enhanced ebook. It is excellent for creating magazines and scrapbooks and lets you publish directly to Amazon or Barnes & Nobles.
Pros | Create beautiful content easily. There is no need to write codes or have a developed sense of beauty, just choose a pre-designed layout. There is also a built-in translation service. |
Cons | It is expensive. The Creative plan is only enough to have a look at the website and try out some features – if you would like to use it, you have to pay for it. |
iBooks Author
- Pricing: free
- Platform: OS X
- Output formats: PDF, epub, iBooks
For those of us who prefer the option to work offline, Apple iBooks Author is an excellent choice with amazing personalization opportunities. And you get the option to easily sell in an iBook Store.
Pros | Apple being Apple, you don’t have to be a genius to create beautiful multimedia content. Just flow in the text, drop in the pictures wherever you want them and you are done. And well, it is free. |
Cons | It only works on a Mac. And while there is the option to export your content as an epub, you cannot be sure how that will look on an Android device. |
(Source: iBooks Author – App Store)
PressBooks
- Pricing: free (with watermarks) to $99 per book
- Platform: cloud
- Output formats: PDF, epub, mobi, XML
PressBooks is aimed for self-pub authors and small publishers. It’s a WordPress based application with limited personalization options unless you are familiar with CSS. You can write your book straight into the browser or import it from Word.
Pros | The platform was designed with books in mind, easy to use for a simple and clear design. Ability to export your book and take it wherever you want to. |
Cons | Watermarked epubs (if free), and limited storage for pictures – better for text-based books. |
Scrivener
- Pricing: free 30-day trial, $19.99 (iOS), $40 (Windows), $45 (Mac)
- Platform: Windows, OS X, iOS
- Output formats: PDF, epub, mobi, HTML etc.
Scrivener is a bit of an outlier in this list, being not a conversion software but the greatest text editor ever made. It is very complicated to write long and complex texts as a Word document. If you want to change or check something later, it is almost impossible to find the right spot. Scrivener was created for compiling complex projects: books, research articles, or screenplays. It’s great for working with footnotes and endnotes, or thousands of references.
Pros | What you see is what you get (WYSIWYG) text editor, inexpensive (one-time fee), amazing for working on long and complex projects and export it into literally any format you would like to. A writer’s best friend. |
Cons | Limited collaboration options – your friend can only co-edit your book if they are also using Scrivener. There is no online interface for ease of sharing either. Scrivener is also very complex and has a steep learning curve. |
(Source: learnscrivenerfast.com)
Zinepal
- Pricing: free to $14 per month
- Platform: cloud
- Output formats: PDF, epub, mobi
Zinepal is similar to Beacon in the sense that it recycles your existing material into ebooks. Using it is literally as simple as using a stick. Just give it your blogs RSS feed and click ‘create.’ It also lets you try it out without registering which is a great plus (I’m still receiving spam from everywhere else I ever subscribed to). After it created your book (it takes around five minutes), you can personalize the output. Don’t put your hopes high; all options look very “newspapery”.
Pros | Easily generate Amazon compatible ebooks from blogs and existing web pages. |
Cons | Outdated design, seems a bit pricey for what it does. |
Calibre
- Pricing: free and open source
- Platform: Windows, macOS, Linux, portable
- Output formats: PDF, epub, mobi
Calibre is the most popular ebook manager software ever created and is my personal favorite. It is mostly known as an ebook library manager: it pretty much handles every input and output format, can send your books to your reader on a wire or wirelessly, lets you easily edit metadata and is great to list your books according to specific information. It sends the right format to the right device.
It is also great as an ebook converter for personal use, or if you would like to send your books to your friends, but the codes it creates are cluttered, and stores (like Amazon) greatly dislike it. (Ebooks created with Calibre often fail the validation.) If you are using Calibre, check our manuscript preparation guide to avoid getting a cluttered code.
Pros | It is free and amazing for all your conversion needs. |
Cons | Often creates cluttered, invalid code. |
Jutoh
- Pricing: free limited trial, $39 (basic), $80 (plus)
- Platform: Windows, macOS, Linux, Raspberry Pi
- Output formats: PDF, epub, mobi, HTML
Although the user interface seems a bit off-putting, I have quickly fallen in love with Jutoh: it seems to be creating amazingly clean epub and mobifiles. The ‘Document Cleanup’ function is a must have: it offers one-click removal of all rubbish coming from the text editors (tabs, line breaks, etc.) It doesn’t even let you convert your book until everything is in order.
Pros | Clean, clutter-free ebooks imported from pretty much every type of documents. What’s not to love. |
Cons | There are only pros. This is a perfect paid alternative to Sigil. |
InDesign
- Pricing: $19.99 per month
- Platform: Windows, macOS
- Output formats: PDF, epub, indd
In desktop publishing, InDesign sets the standards. No need can arise that cannot be solved using InDesign. The software today is used not only to typeset beautiful books but is here for all your publishing needs. ou can create presentations, forms, and websites using InDesign.
InDesign is by no means an intuitive, easy-to-use software. It takes some time and effort to explore and master it. InDesign is amazing to create print-ready, press-friendly PDFs. On the downside, however, exporting your beautiful book into an epub might not turn out as well as expected. Sometimes, it is just easier to start it over from scratch and ditch the extensive formatting.
Pros | You can use the same software for all your desktop, web and ebook publishing needs. Can be used for both fixed-layout and reflowable layout books. |
Cons | Creating an ebook with this one often creates cluttered, invalid code; has a steep learning curve. |
(Source)
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Here at Artful Publications we specialize in using InDesign to help passionate people turn their content into stunning eBooks. Although we’d be more than happy to help you out, in this special blog post we’ve decided to let you in on the beginning tips and tricks to enable you to create your own eBook in InDesign.
First, let’s talk about formats.
Two of the most common formats are PDF and EPUB. PDF eBooks are what we use most for our clients, because they allow you to create beautiful photo-heavy books, and can easily be sold directly on your website. the EPUB is the file format most often found on Amazon and other sales channels, and allow for less flexibility design-wise.
Today, we’re going to focus on how to create your eBook in EPUB format for sales through Amazon or your avenue of choice.
If you are unfamiliar with eBook formats and EPUB, you might be asking what exactly is an EPUB file? Esko artpro 16 0 1 download free. The EPUB (electronic publication) file format is essentially a package that contains XML files, XHTML files and optional CSS style sheets, in addition to fonts and images.
Unlike the fixed-page format of the PDF file, EPUB eBook files are reflowable (not fixed) and adapt the content to the capabilities of various devices; from wide or narrow screens, high or low resolutions, etc.
Also unlike fixed-page PDF files, EPUB files give the reader greater control over the eBook, with the ability to increase the font size, change the resolution, highlight and copy text and add bookmarks throughout the eBook.
One of the great advantages to using InDesign to create your eBook is the amount of control you will have over your layout. There are amazing tools you can use in InDesign, and Word simply cannot compete in this area. InDesign also shields you from the underlying XHTML and CSS code which are the building blocks of an EPUB file (in other words, you don’t even have to worry about coding when using InDesign!)
If you’re curious about costs, you are going to need to pay to use InDesign. However! Good news: Adobe no longer requires you to spend $1,000’s to purchase a product – now you can pay $50 / month for access to EVERY app (including Photoshop!) with their Creative Cloud membership. So, you will need to invest no more than $50 on this project if you cancel your Adobe membership before the first month is up.
You might be questioning the screen right now, thinking “But I’m not a graphic designer?!” Don’t fear; I’ve made this guide as comprehensive as possible, so that any beginner can use this as a guide to using InDesign to create a professional EPUB eBook.
Step 1: Creating a new document
Go to File > New > Document to create a new document in InDesign.
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In the dialog box, enter the following settings:
- Intent: Digital Publishing (If you have a version of InDesign that isn’t CS6, DPS or CC, select Intent: Web)
- Page Size: Ipad > Select an orientation to suit your needs. (Page size is not crucial when creating EPUB files in InDesign, as the pages will adapt to the device screen size. Ideally you want to be working with the 1024×768 pixel range or smaller.)
Insert the number of tentative pages you think you will be working with. Leave the columns at 1, and leave margins at the default size or increase the left and right margins slightly. Most eReaders have default margin settings, so try to avoid adding lots of space to these.
You document color mode will be RGB as this is a digital publication (you will need to ensure your images and color swatches are also RGB), and dimensions should be in pixels.
Step 2: Mastering master pages
Go to Window > Pages to bring up the Pages panel.
Select your “A” master page and create the templated look and feel of your ebook. Consider things like page numbers, headers and footers.
To insert a page number, select Type > Insert Special Character > Markers > Current Page Number.
Master pages are a fantastically useful tool to ensure consistency throughout your publication. When you update the master page, all pages which you’ve set to that same master page will update automatically – making your life instantly easier!
You can also have a variety of different master pages for different things – chapter titles, text heavy pages, image pages. Use master pages to set up your grid to guide yourself through the rest of the creation of the document.
Step 3: Placing text on the page
To add text to the page, simply select the Text tool from the tools palette , and click and drag on the page to create a text frame.
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It is crucially important to define and consistently apply paragraph and character styles throughout the content in your eBook file. InDesign will use the styles you’ve created as a basis for the CSS style sheets in the exported EPUB file. Since the CSS style sheets determine the formatting of the text in the EPUB file, this is definitely not a step you want to miss.
To create paragraph styles:
- Go to Window > Styles > Paragraph Styles to open the paragraph styles panel.
- Highlight the text you want to create a style for
- Click the menu button on the paragraph styles panel and select ‘New Paragraph Style…‘
- This will bring up a dialog box where you can name the paragraph style (e.g. heading, subheading, text, captions, etc), and further define the details of the style.
I mentioned in a previous article to use InDesign’s Space Before and/or Space After controls in your paragraph styles to add space between paragraphs. This is not only a visual thing to ensure maximum consistency and professionalism throughout your eBook, but also because those extra ‘enters’ between paragraphs will be ignored in the exported EPUB file.
When creating a new paragraph style, or editing an existing one, the dialog box is where you will find these settings. Click the ‘Indents and Spacing’ tab on the left and edit the Space Before and Space After dimensions. I like to keep my settings on Preview (bottom left corner) so I can see what I’m changing as I go along.
Step 4: Inserting images
Any imagery you insert into your eBook should be 72dpi (screen resolution) and RGB color. To insert images:
- Select where in the text you want your image to sit, and then select File > Place (or Ctrl + D / Command + D).
- A dialog box will appear where you’ll need to select your desired image and select ‘Open’.
- Once your image is placed, you can resize it to how you’d like it to look.
If you place images in your InDesign file without anchoring them to the specific location you want them, this position will be ignored in the exported EPUB file, and your images will appear at the end of the section they belong to, or even at the very end of the eBook. Ensure you anchor your images within text flows so you can have some control over their position relative to the exported text.
Step 5: Creating a Table of Contents
Once your content is looking how you want it to, it’s time to generate the table of contents (ToC). Keep in mind, while your ToC will be a page in your InDesign document, it won’t actually appear as a page in your EPUB file but will become the EPUB navigation.
- Select Layout > Table of Contents.
- In the dialog box, select your heading/title text paragraph style under the ‘Other Styles’ list and select the ‘Add’ button to move it across into the included paragraph styles. (This tells InDesign everything with that paragraph style applied will be included in the ToC.)
- Within this dialog box you can also edit the title of your ToC (mine is set as the default ‘Contents’) and the paragraph style you want your ToC title to be (mine is set as ‘heading’).
- Underneath the ‘Styles in Table of Contents’ section, you need to select which paragraph style you want the ToC to be set in (my entry style is set to ‘body text’).
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You can see why it becomes so important to consistently set up paragraph styles, as this makes your life so much easier!
Once you’re happy with the settings for your ToC, select ‘OK’ and just like creating a text frame above, click and drag to create a text frame for your ToC. I only have one page in my demo document, but hopefully you will have more and InDesign will automatically create your ToC for you.
To update your ToC, simply select Layout > Update Table of Contents… and InDesign will automatically update your ToC for you.
Step 6: Exporting to EPUB
Before exporting, select Window > Articles to open the Articles panel. Here you’ll need to drag items from your layout into the Articles panel to define the order in which they will be displayed in an EPUB.
When you’re happy with your eBook and ready to export it:
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- Select File > Export.
- Name your eBook and save it in the correct file location.
- From the Save as Type list, select EPUB and then select Save.
- In the EPUB Export Options dialog box, you will need to specify the desired options in the General, Image, and Advanced areas.
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Hopefully this beginner’s guide gives you the tools and confidence to begin creating your EPUB eBook in InDesign. Still feel like you need further assistance? Leave a comment below with your question, or contact us. We’re here to help!