Quote from: Bill Hiatt on April 08, 2024, 08:29:55 AM

I tried to gently suggest it might not be a great idea. I don't feel comfortable aggressively denouncing what another author is trying to do, particularly an author I don't know that well yet. I did point out that the experience might not be optimal for readers.

Why do they want to do that?

I don't know. She wants to match the paperback, but why wasn't really discussed.

The book just came out in paper. I suggested she'd reach a larger if she also had an ebook version. That's how I got into the whole square book conversation.

A beta reader questioned something I have been using for years. Now, I think it might be incorrect.

When a character makes a phone call, should the responses from the person on the other end of the call be italicized? Like this?

“Hello, Marc speaking.”
“Hello Marc, it’s Detective Trimble.”
“You know your name comes up on my Caller ID.”
“Sorry, it’s an old habit from the Marines.”

TIA

I tried to gently suggest it might not be a great idea. I don't feel comfortable aggressively denouncing what another author is trying to do, particularly an author I don't know that well yet. I did point out that the experience might not be optimal for readers.

Why do they want to do that?

I tried to gently suggest it might not be a great idea. I don't feel comfortable aggressively denouncing what another author is trying to do, particularly an author I don't know that well yet. I did point out that the experience might not be optimal for readers.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback. I will pass it on and see what happens.

I hope you also toned down my outrage  I was a little over-the-top knowing it wasn't you personally.

I wanted to find a solution sort of as a challenge. There might be a better way to do it, though I couldn't find or think of anything better for now.

I've seen someone play around with formatting before, citing creative formatting as a choice to be part of artistic expression as a whole. It can become something more than a book, perhaps, in that way. But as a reader, I still prefer books be reflowable so I can choose my own settings. When it comes down to it, readers will decide. Either they will see the Look Inside and decide against purchasing or return it if they don't like what the author chose.

To be clear, the VPS plan I have with BH is unmanaged. But if there are certain things they want to have control of, like updating the OS only in a particular way, then they probably should do it more efficiently.

I like Wordpress and want to keep it, at least until I decide I no longer need a separate author website. That said, I might well counsel new authors on small budgets to consider Substack as a viable blog replacement. There aren't as many choices in terms of format and layout, but you can do all the basic things you need to have at least a reasonably clear and attractive layout.  I'm trying a book page now to see how well it works.

The one obvious constraint is that Substack doesn't expect to be merely a platform on which to advertise other sites. It certainly doesn't prohibit authors from advertising sales, new releases, etc. It also allow book pages to become part of your Substack. But the emphasis is on quality content creation for Substack audiences. That's the focus of the newsletter, and SS makes it quite clear that it will close accounts if someone is just promoting another business there. So yes, Substack is free to use as a blogging platform, even if you don't have paid subscriptions from which Substack can take a cut. But especially in such a case, you need to put your time in contributing to the community in various ways. That's not an unreasonable requirement, but there is a time commitment involved.