Among the most common novice writers formatting their ebooks run into is including headers, footers and page numbers in their manuscript. Unfortunately, this often leads to the book’s title, author’s name, and page numbers appearing in the middle of the text on an ereader.
There’s no need to include any headers, footers or page numbers in a manuscript formatted for an ebook. The software used to translate your formatted manuscript into a format readable on an ebook won’t treat the headers and footers as would your Microsoft Word program.
In any case, you don’t need to include a header indicating the book’s title in an ebook. At least with Kindle, the software that translates your formatted manuscript automatically places the title at the top of the ereader screen.
In addition, page numbers are superfluous in an ebook, as readers can adjust the text’s font and point size, and hence change how many words appear on a screen before the “page” has to be turned.
If reformatting your Word manuscript for a paperback into an ebook, always delete all of the headers, footers and page numbers from the document.
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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.
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