Calibre is my go-to tool for all book format conversions. No, I have no affiliate marketing with them. They are a free program software that can help you convert a pdf or word or any other document to epub, mobi, pdf, rtf and word.

That is so cool. I stumbled on it when I was trying to get my own mobil filed made three years ago. Back then Kindle publishing didn’t auto convert manuscripts and authors had to convert documents themselves. Thank goodness, we’ve come a long way from then.

Calibre for Book Conversion

Now, I need conversions for various reasons. Book bloggers will only read kindle formats, others prefer PDF (I’m guessing for the voice option), some prefer epub files for their pocket readers. Either way I’m not one of those people who’s going to write to my publishers asking for a book format. It annoys them and they’re often slow to respond.

Often when you have requests for ARC’s you want to get back to the reviewer or reader quickly. So I use Calibre and do it myself. I tried getting other conversion software and found they had a free trial  and conversion issues. Trust me, this is all you need for simple stuff.

Now Calibre is simple to use.  You can start by downloading it here. 

How to use Calibre?

This tutorial from Goodereader is excellent.

Now, the first time you do it, you’ll suck.  The first time, I did it, my cover looked weird and I didn’t put in the metadata. These things are important, because when you forward the file to someone else, things like name, tags, publisher, date of publishing are important for the file for digital rights. It also gives your file a professional copy. So play around for a bit before you do real conversions of your book.

TEST READ

After you do conversions, test read your file. I made a major mistake with this. I hadn’t test read the file I’d created and there were weird dots and question marks all over my file. It cost me a host of reviews. So check and recheck.

The best thing is its free. Calibre is absolutely free and so its a blessing to any self-publishing indie author.

In other news, THE MILANESE STARS has got some excellent 5 star reviews. 

I’m also burning the midnight oil, getting Painting Kuwait Violet ready. Its last edit was completed this week. My publisher and I have also changed the name of my first sports series romance. The draft of Ten Reminders for the Grieving Christian is ready and I’m waiting for first edits for the fall anthology. Phew. I’m tired but good tired, if you know what I mean.

What do you use for conversion of your files? I’d like to know.