<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Judith-and-the-Holy-Ferns/dp/B004QGYAFU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;s=digital-text&amp;qid=1299226074&amp;sr=8-1" target="_blank"><img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-7588" style="border: 1px solid black;" title="Judith" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Judith-225x300.jpg" alt="" width="225" height="300" /></a>Today Amazon published my first direct from Scrivener-to-Kindle work, a short story set in Rome, though not part of the Costa series, called <em>Judith and the Holy Ferns. </em>I put this up because it's an unusual piece of work I'd quite like to get out there, but also as a test of how easy it is to go from Scrivener 2 to Kindle with no intermediate apps or conversions.

I'm also interested in seeing how many people will think it worth reading; you can <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Judith-and-the-Holy-Ferns/dp/B004QGYAFU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;s=digital-text&amp;qid=1299226074&amp;sr=8-1" target="_blank">find it in the UK store here</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Judith-Holy-Ferns-ebook/dp/B004QGYAFU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;m=A7B2F8DUJ88VZ&amp;s=digital-text&amp;qid=1299226147&amp;sr=8-1" target="_blank">in the US one here</a>. It's priced at £1.14 (99p plus VAT which applies to ebooks, sigh) in the UK, to match my Macmillan short story of a similar length, <em>Dead Men's Shoes</em>, and at $1.84 in the US.

This is a step-by-step guide detailing how I got this 9000-word story from Scrivener on to Kindle, so that those of you wanting to do the same can see in detail how it happened.

First, watch this video which is produced by the Scrivener people. It begins by describing the process involved in producing an epub ebook, the kind used by iBooks and other places. I haven't put this work up on iBooks; to do it directly demands you get an ISBN, which is a pain frankly, and overkill for a 99p short story, nor do I have the time right now to deal with iBook aggregators. Besides, I think Kindle wipes the floor with every other ebook delivery system. It's quick, easy and very, very popular.  The process for getting a Kindle file follows the epub pattern in the video. Part way through you will see how to choose Kindle over epub.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cgJ8x-R86M[/youtube]

To go further you will need to be signed up for Kindle Digital Publishing and to have <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?ie=UTF8&amp;docId=1000234621" target="_blank">downloaded the KindleGen plugin and the Kindle Previewer here.</a> Note: it only works on Intel Macs running 10.5 or higher. So Tiger users won't be able to take advantage of it (this is an Amazon limitation, not a Scrivener one).

All done? Next, get yourself a cover, a jpeg 600 x 800 at 72 dpi. It will appear on Kindle hardware in black and white, but not everyone uses Kindle hardware. Kindle apps are very popular too. So my advice is: choose a cover that's colour and will work in both. The Kindle Previewer will show you what it looks like in black and white.

My cover for <em>Judith and the Holy Ferns</em> is light and minimal and self-produced. Flashy cover designs are essential in paper book publishing where they are used to generate advance sales from retailers among other things. I'm not entirely convinced they are so high on the buy/don't buy process in epublishing, but that's a discussion for another time. This is a 99p short story. I'm not forking out $1000 for a commercial book cover.

When you have a suitable jpeg drag it somewhere into the Binder in your Scrivener project so that it sits as a separate file like this. This is important. You can't import that cover into your final Kindle file if it's outside Scrivener.

Now go to the Compile option in the File Menu.

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Contents1.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7616" title="Contents" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Contents1-640x600.png" alt="" width="635" height="595" /></a>

We will be running down the list of processes on the left and dealing with the options as they go. The first is obvious -- contents. This will determine the text elements in the manuscript you want to go into the finished book. There are just three chapters in this short story, each with names and manual chapter numbers. So I don't need to worry about auto chapter numbering (which is possible and the video shows how). I just tick the chapters I want to include.

Next comes formatting.

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Formatting1.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7617" title="Formatting" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Formatting1-640x599.png" alt="" width="635" height="594" /></a>

This isn't text and font size -- Kindle takes care of that for you. This is to do with how chapter headings are dealt with. If your book is hierarchical -- parts and chapters, for example -- this is where you dictate that those headings are different to the body text. I only have Level 1 text documents in here -- the third option. So while the others are ticked they won't have any effect. I've changed the header setting to Heading 3 (just put your cursor next to title) to make it bigger than the body text and on the right I've inserted Page padding of eight lines. This will make new chapters start a little way down the page, something that's becoming popular in ebook formatting.

Processing options...

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Processing.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7602" title="Processing" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Processing-640x533.png" alt="" width="635" height="528" /></a>

By clicking 'Do not add page padding to the first document' I make sure the first chapter of the book starts at the top of the page, which I prefer. This is just personal taste. I don't need to do anything with the other options.

Separators...

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Separators.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7603" title="Separators" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Separators-640x598.png" alt="" width="635" height="593" /></a>

This threw me at first and caused my one hiccup. I had the text set to break to a new line between sections. In order to generate proper chapter headings and a table of contents (and Kindle likes TOCs, even for small documents) you need to separate everything with a section break. Otherwise you will get nagged for not having a TOC.

Cover... just pick the jpeg you already have in your Scrivener binder which will appear as an option in the popup.

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Cover2.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7605" title="Cover2" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Cover2-640x533.png" alt="" width="635" height="528" /></a>

E-Book options... these will give you a TOC that Kindle will like.

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Ebook-options.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7606" title="Ebook options" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Ebook-options-640x526.png" alt="" width="635" height="521" /></a>

Text Options...

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Text-options.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7607" title="Text options" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Text-options-640x531.png" alt="" width="635" height="526" /></a>

You can clean up text if you want here -- I don't need to.

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/html-options.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7608" title="html options" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/html-options-640x596.png" alt="" width="635" height="591" /></a>

This doesn't apply to a short story with no internal links, but I left it selected anyway. But if you use internal wiki-like links in Scrivener this will recreate them in the Kindle document, which could be useful for non-fiction projects.

Finally, as far as a modest project like this is concerned... Meta-Data.

<a href="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Metadata.png"><img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-7609" title="Metadata" src="http://davidhewson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Metadata-640x597.png" alt="" width="635" height="592" /></a>

This is where you deal with title, publisher and author information. That's all you need enter really as far as I can see -- forget about ID numbers and dates. I suspect something ought to be entered under Rights but I don't know what and Kindle DRMs the files anyway so it doesn't much bother me.

One caveat. Kindle demands you put in the author as Last name, First name. The current release version of Scrivener isn't happy with this and recognises it as two authors. At the time of writing, early March 2011, you need to download the latest Scrivener beta to get this working properly. <a href="http://www.literatureandlatte.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=17&amp;t=11692" target="_blank">You can find it here</a>. After that type in Last name, First name and it will work.

The final option is simply a link to where the KindleGen plugin is kept on your Mac. The other options can be left for me. After that click Compile and check your output in Kindle Viewer (and a Kindle app too). When you're happy with it upload to Kindle Digital Publishing and wait for it to go public after it's approved.

This is a simple process for a fairly simple short story. Anyone with hierarchical novels, in folders or as sub documents, should take care to get those options right in the Formatting section and to check that the separators are working fine too.

Once you have a working system you can save it in the Compile window and simply reload the settings for another publication later. This is getting as close to an automated ebook process as I can imagine right now, and is <em>much</em> slicker than anything that I've seen before for Kindle publication. One more amazing facet in the amazing piece of software that's Scrivener.

Before long I hope to show you something from this that is rather more complex. But it will require some editing first.

Oh, and do remember. This is processing, not writing. It's important, but not as important as the words themselves.