#Kindle Formatting Issue - Hidden Text

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I just recently came across an issue that had me stumped for a bit, but I got it figured out.  I wanted to share this with other authors out there in case you’re struggling with the same situation.

I made my upcoming release SACRIFICE into a Kindle book so I could do a read-through on my Kindle.  I find it easier to see errors this way.  Anyway, I came to a spot in the book that looked entirely different from what I was seeing on my screen in Word.  

Below, I have substituted ** so as to not spoil the story, but you’ll see what my issue was.

This was how it looked in Word
This is how it looked on my Kindle (short the highlighting)
I re-opened my Word document, and sure enough it looked fine.  Where is all of this come from, and "tight anyway"?  Anyhow, I realized what was happening was there was hidden text there, so I used the Show/Hide feature of Word hoping it would help.  If you've ever formatted a Kindle or paperback book before, you'll be familiar with this tool.  If not, here's a picture of what it looks like.

This feature works like a toggle; press to turn it on, press to turn it off.  Anyway, the following is what the passage looked like when I turned it on:



Whoa! Yep, there's my issue.  So I grabbed all that garble, saved the document and made another Kindle book from it.  Perfect!

Hope this helps someone else out there.

Comments

  1. Author R. Mac WheelerJune 27, 2012 at 10:03 PM

    No fair.

    That was an easy one. *he pouts*

    I've had so many formatting issues on my old files (novels that had been on the shelf for a while) I wish I had done what the manuals suggest...bite the bullet, paste as text and start reformatting all over again.

    I had that.

    Glad you found your glitch. *curses Word*

    - Mac

    ReplyDelete
  2. Author R. Mac WheelerJune 27, 2012 at 10:04 PM

    ?? er..."I had that"

    should have been

    I hate that

    ReplyDelete
  3. EricJune 28, 2012 at 1:10 AM

    That's why I don't use word to format my e-books.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Ken Hoss June 28, 2012 at 1:13 PM

    This is why when I'm working on my WIP, I have this toggled on at all times. Saves a lot of headaches.

    Eric, I use Word and only Word to format my books. I tried formatting using Adobe Acrobat once and it was a disaster.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Gail M Baugniet - AuthorJuly 3, 2012 at 5:45 PM

    Hi Carolyn, I'm dropping in from Ken's site. I always have the formatting symbols character toggled when I work on a manuscript. I read somewhere to use Courier font to proofread as errors show up best in this format. I'm trying that now but I'm not sure it makes much difference than Times Roman.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Writer Pat NewcombeJuly 16, 2012 at 8:02 AM

    Just to let you know I have featured you today on my bloglights tour.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Carolyn ArnoldJuly 16, 2012 at 8:17 AM

      Hi Pat, thank you. Would you have a link for me so that I can share with my networks?

      Delete

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