Why Purchase Your Own ISBN?

First of all, what is an ISBN and why do you need it?

ISBN stands for International Standard Book Number. An ISBN is a 13 digit number that identifies your book and publisher. You have to have one in order to sell your book.

Now that we have that out of the way, why is it important to own your own ISBN?

For the first book I ever self-published, The Lilac Princess, I went through an agency. They provided the ISBN. This means their publishing company was identified with that title. For my second book, A Turtle’s Magical Adventure, I used the free one on CreateSpace. This means CreateSpace is identified with that title. Then, for my third book, Little Birdie Grows Up, I purchased my own ISBN because the person doing the formatting for me used IngramSpark and IngramSpark requires you to have your own ISBN. This means I am identified with that title as the publishing company. At first, I was unhappy about having to purchase my own ISBN for IngramSpark because it costs $125 for one ISBN. But, then I did a little research and found out the importance of having my own ISBN. The good news is there are sales where you can buy 10 ISBN’s for $250 and sometimes even cheaper than that.

What I have come to realize is that in order for me to control the price of my first book, I had to take it back from the agency which fortunately was okay and in accordance with my contract. I used my own ISBN and I did change the cover and added some pictures to the inside but I didn’t have to. However, with my second book, I cannot take it back from CreateSpace. Well, not easily anyway, I would need to change the title, possibly cover, and then provide my own ISBN.

What’s interesting and also disconcerting is that when using CreateSpace and providing my own ISBN, my book isn’t available for wider distribution.

So, you have to think about what you want to do with your books. If you’d like to be able to take them somewhere else and have them printed through other printing companies say Smashwords, LuLu, etc. then you’ll need your own ISBN. If you want to be able to market to libraries and stores, then you’ll need to use IngramSpark who is fine with you using your own ISBN or if you use CreateSpace, you’ll need to use the free one they provide.

All in all, for maximum freedom, it’s best to have your own ISBN so you can take your book wherever you want to and also use IngramSpark so you can use your own ISBN and have wider distribution.

This is all a learning curve for those of us new to self-publishing. Hope this tidbit helps you a little. Please feel free to comment and share your experiences and expertise.

Wanda Luthman has her Masters of Arts in both Mental Health Counseling and Guidance Counseling from Rollins College located in beautiful Winter Park, Florida. She has worked as a Licensed Mental Health Counselor, Adjunct Professor, and Hospice Counselor for teens. She’s currently a Guidance Counselor at a local High School. She has self-published 4 children’s books (The Lilac Princess, A Turtle’s Magical Adventure, Gloria and the Unicorn, and Little Birdie Grows Up). She belongs to the National Pen Women Organization in Cape Canaveral; the Florida’s Writers Association; Space Coast Authors; and Brevard Authors Forum. She presently resides in Brevard County Florida with her husband of 22 years and 2 dogs. Her daughter is away at college, like Little Birdie, she has left the nest. To download a free ebook, visit Wanda Luthman’s website at www.wandaluthmanwordpress.com and follow her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/wluthman.

Fear of Formatting

I have a novel forthcoming from MuseItUp publishing, a science fiction novel for tweens/young adults, and as part of the novel, I created a poet and wrote thirty-one of his poems. Eight of the poems appear in the novel, and I wanted to publish the whole collection to go along with the book. I dragged my feet - first about obtaining permission to use the poems that appear in the book, and second, when I had permission, about putting the book together.

Fear of formatting held me back, but at last, with the deadline approaching, I jumped in.


I created the cover on the above using my image and a CreateSpace template.

Covers: This was my first sticking point. But fear not, designing one's own book cover is easy with CreateSpace, as they have cover templates and images you can use. Or you can use your own photo, or go to one of the many websites that offer photographs and buy one. I went to Bigshotphoto to purchase the image for the cover of "Sand in the Desert." It cost me $2.99 for the small size.

For the cover of SandInTheDesert, see Karen Cioffi's post: http://margaretfieland.com/blog1/2012/05/26/design-your-own-ebook-cover/


For the formatting, alas, there was no cure but to jump in. CreateSpace does have templates you can download and use for the various size finished documents. They have predefined layouts, page styles, and the like, and you fill in the blanks (or sometimes, generic text) with your own.

I downloaded and used one.  And now, many hours later, I have just ordered my second proof copy - the first had problems with both formatting and content -- and I know a lot more about formats.

I use OpenOffice rather than Ms Word, so the menus will be slightly different, but here are some of the things I learned to watch out for:

Page setup options as to the distance from the top and bottom and from the sides.
Whether the format is MIRRORED or not. 

Header and Footer: Do you have them? Do they have the same contents left and right?

What format follows this one? I got hung up on this because the LEFT page format had LEFT as the next format instead of the RIGHT page format. The RIGHT page format had the same problem - RIGHT was the next format instead of LEFT. This screwed up my page numbers.

Paragraph: Line spacing and distance between paragraphs.

Fonts: This one is pretty straightforward in your document, but CreateSpace wants the fonts embedded in the document. OpenOffice doesn't appear to have an option to put them in a .doc file, so I had to select "export to PDF" and check the  option to include the fonts in the PDF.

Size of your finished book:  The page formats include the page size, which will, of course, affect how much space you have for text. The CreateSpace templates will give you a guide as to how much space to leave for the margins - the INNER is the critical one, as you will need to leave enough room for the binding.

Proof Reading: There's no substitute for proof reading. Proof read for formatting, and again for content. I read through for the formatting, then again for the order of my poems, and once again for the poems' content.

My personal criteria for passing something out of a proof phase is that I read it through twice without finding any errors. Sad experience has shown me that I can overlook an error once through, but the chance I will overlook the same error on another reading is small.  Yes, this is tedious. Yes, it's saved my ass more than once.

Here are some references:

For OpenOffice:

http://www.linuxtopia.org/online_books/office_guides/openoffice_3_writer_user_guide/openoffice_writer_Book_chapter_sequence.html

http://plan-b-for-openoffice.org/ooo-help/r2.1/en-US/WIN/writer/guide/header_pagestyles


Here are some for MS Word:

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Microsoft-Word-1058/2009/6/Mirror-margins-headers.htm 

http://www.ehow.com/how_4488436_lay-out-book-manuscript-microsoft.html


I just ordered my second proof copy. The first had both formatting and content issues, ones I didn't spot using the digital proof copy.  I'll be examining this copy carefully, both for formatting and for content. For each, if I can go through it twice without finding any errors, then I'll declare it good to go.

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