Logikal Solutions has recently released “Infinite Exposure” in eBook format. This book will follow the modern publishing model of being released in eBook first until sales reach a sufficient level to warrant putting out a hard cover version. It’s the best way to go green and a business model most publishing houses will have to adopt if they want to stay in business.

“Infinite Exposure” is a story about how the off-shoring of IT jobs leads to the largest terrorist strike the free world has ever seen, and ultimately nuclear war. It is not a novel for people who like romance stories with happy endings.

The book was written entirely in OpenOffice and converted to both ePub and Sony formats via Calibre. The Palm format was converted to PML via an OpenOffice plug in, then a nasty Windows box was used to layout the PML via the studio program. There are free promotional versions containing the first 18 chapters available.

We have listed the book on the Sony site directly and the Palm version on eBookMall. We are currently looking for the best deal in putting up the ePub version for iPhone users. We have been in touch with Stanza, which has a $1000 setup fee in their contract on top of taking a cut from sales. A new service, PixelPapyrus wants $3000 and a 20% cut on top of what the Apple Store takes.

What site carries ePub format and is the easiest to deal with ?

Thanks

You are absolutely right that the Stanza desktop program allows for fairly easy conversion of books and addition to your iPhone. However, if you want to use eReader (which I do think is the best iPhone reader out there), you have to convert to pdb.

I have some problems with how Stanza converts a few of my books, but those are really minor. Overall, though, this series is designed to help people convert and use ebook software.

Most Word versions (with the exception of 2007) have a supported Read in Reader add-in to create .lit files. (RiR will work in 2007 with a little nudging, but forcing it takes options away from the end user)

Calibre does a pretty decent job with .lit to .epub — better than Stanza Desktop as far as certain reflowable text formatting concerns go. Most validators don’t love files sourced from Word, but they do pass.

You’ll find, too, that many epubs generate filtered html files from Word. We’ve done this in the past, but starting with all new releases in 2009, we will be making available a raw .html version that’s stripped down to xml compliant tags, and totally reflow-friendly.

…and DRM is the devil. Hax ftw.

I don’t get your post since you are not taking the Stanza Desktop program into consideration for all this.

If you have the Stanza Desktop installed to your Mac or Windows PC then it will conveniently convert the non-DRM ebooks of most formats for you and transfer the eBook to your iPhone or Kindle.

If you are buying a eBook directly from say Fictionwise on your iPhone only then does Stanza require only ePub and eReader DRM formats because there is no way to convert the file when using your iPhone only.

Otherwise just read the Stanza FAQ for the current supported list that the Desktop Stanza Program will support and convert for your iPhone/Kindle…

Stanza Desktop contains built-in reading support for Amazon Kindle, Mobipocket, Microsoft LIT, PalmDoc, Microsoft Word, Rich Text Format, HTML, and PDF. Stanza iPhone / iPod Touch supports ePub and eReader.

My suggestion is if you are buying DRM eBooks and you are using windows buy Microsoft .lit and use convertlit and transfer the now non-drm file to your iPhone using Stanza Desktop.

If you are using Mac the Stanza Desktop program allows you to read non-DRM mobipocket and non-DRM Microsoft .lit so get it for those reasons too.

The one nice thing about Bookshelf for Iphone is that you don’t have to convert files. It reads almost all kinds.

Fictionwise only read Ereader format for personal content (ie books you have bought innother formats and want to add to the iPhone).

Stanza will convert a number if formats, even MS Lit but I have had look and feel issues with Stanza.

Thanks Jane. Without you, many of us poor defenseless (*snerk*) Romancelandians would have to brave the scary technogeek sites to try and ferret this info out.

However, I have two important areas that I also need more info on before I make a decision, and this would apply to your subsequent posts in this series, too:

Are the results satisfactory? By that I mean, when reading a converted ebook, is it formatted as well as a native ebook or is it screwy but tolerable; does the device treat it like a native ebook- does it remember where you left off reading in these converted books; can it be bookmarked?

What format and/or conversion program seems to work best on that device? I’m not sure if there is one answer for that since it may depend on the format (LIT, PDF, ePub, etc.).

Hmmm… I’m not sure all of that applies to an iPhone because it really doesn’t have a native ebook format. But I’d still like to know what reading on an iPhone is like. Or is all this completely off-topic since you are concentrating on conversion programs?

I am not a techy person and this sounds like something even I can follow. Thank you!