Top Ten Lulu Book Boo Boos

Since LK joined the LLBR team, we’ve been compiling a list of common mistakes and errors which tend to grate our nerves while reading books, and also turns us off when we are considering books for possible reviews. Since I only recently started sending out rejection letters, I thought it was important to let authors know common reasons why their book might get rejected for a review outside of just being a theme we aren’t interested in reviewing at this time. While this is NOT a list of set-in-stone guidelines used to determine who gets reviewed and who doesn’t, we hope this list will at least help future authors polish their book for publication.

• Punctuation, spelling, and typos – none of us are perfect and every book has flaws, but your Lulu storefront/book page can not afford to contain these as people will take one look and decide that if you can’t put together a short blurb without errors, your book is too flawed to read. Editing has always been a dark cloud over the POD world, which is why accomplishing complete accuracy on your Lulu book page is an absolute must!  Have someone review your work prior to releasing for distribution.  If there are major errors, then it is too late to pull it back without paying for another distribution.  Plus, you don’t want a reputation for releasing material that is not ready for prime time.
• Know your characters and where they are!  If his big blue eyes are so important to point out on page ten, they better not be brown eyes on page twenty.  If she’s drinking a beer on page seven, she better not be finishing scotch on page eight.  While these mistakes should really fall under rule #1 as typos, I bring attention to them only because I’ve seen this happen quite a bit.  If you have a lot of characters to keep up with, I suggest buying a notebook and writing out character sketches or outlines of everything about them you need to know.
• Formatting, formatting, formatting – Books are not emails or business letters.  They have an expected format. If you know nothing about formatting a book, pull about 10 traditionally published books off your shelf and study their layout. Or go to a library or bookstore and just thumb through some popular books. Pay close attention to the number of blank pages between title pages, copyright pages, dedication pages, and Chapter 1. Also pay attention to page numbering (something my very own book fell victim to earlier this year). Are the numbers at the top or bottom, centered or flushed to the right? What page does the first chapter start on?
• It is necessary to have distinction between the header and footers and the text.  Either by ensuring that there is a line space between information in the header/footer and the manuscript text or at the very least a line that indicates separation.  It is not only confusing, but becomes quite annoying to read someone’s work and at the bottom of every page, looking like it is part of the text of the book is the author’s name or a page number.  Visually, these things must be separated.
• Speaking of those blank pages, format your Lulu book preview so that those blank pages are eliminated. Your book preview should be just that – a preview of the story itself. Too many times LK and I go to look at a Lulu book preview and its 15 pages consisting of a title page, blank pages, a copyright page, a dedication page, more blank pages, 6 pages of preface, 2 pages of an introduction, and then maybe 1 page of actual story. Even if I’m possibly considering a book for review based on the Pick Me query alone, if the Lulu preview lacks at least a good 4 pages of the story, I usually reject it. Since Lulu allows limited number of pages for preview, create a custom review by removing all of the blank pages and acknowledgment, etc. pages from the preview so that the reader gets the most value content from the preview possible.
• No preview at all is a No-No! It’s like putting your book in a glass box in an actual bookstore and expecting someone to buy it based on the cover alone. Even Amazon.com allows browsers to peek inside the book on line before purchasing it.
• In the synopsis on your Lulu book page, don’t be personal. Don’t tell how all of your friends/family loved the book and think that you are the greatest author.  These people might think your book is crap, but they’d still tell you it was gold just because you are related. This definitely tells the reader that you are a rookie and have not had an objective assessment done.  Maybe one of your relatives who read it and thought it was great was Uncle Joe in Butte, MT.  So what?  If Uncle Joe turns out to be a freelance writer/editor, or working for a major publishing firm, or anything involved in the writing game, then refer to him in that guise and not as Uncle Joe – it carries more weight.
• Justify the alignment of your manuscript. Too many times I see that jagged right edge in PDF files, and it drives me crazy. This is a quick fix in Word documents with just one click of the mouse. Don’t know what I’m talking about? Here’s a sample of work not justified. Check out the right margin…

A severe headache woke me from my dreams. I dabbed at my tongue with my fingers, thinking I tasted copper. Maybe it was just the wine we’d had with supper—but wait— Lorraine and I had not shared a bottle of wine in years. I sat up in bed and for several seconds I did not know where I was. I did not recognize the aging beautiful woman sleeping soundly beside me. She was nuzzled into my arm like she knew me. I pulled myself from her grasp, threw back the sheets, and put my feet on the floor. My sudden movement woke her.

Now here’s the same text, but with a justified right edge…

A severe headache woke me from my dreams. I dabbed at my tongue with my fingers, thinking I tasted copper. Maybe it was just the wine we’d had with supper—but wait— Lorraine and I had not shared a bottle of wine in years. I sat up in bed and for several seconds I did not know where I was. I did not recognize the aging beautiful woman sleeping soundly beside me. She was nuzzled into my arm like she knew me. I pulled myself from her grasp, threw back the sheets, and put my feet on the floor. My sudden movement woke her.

• Invest in a decent book cover, whether that be time or money…or both. Pulling up a “kewl” photo of yourself or a friend in Paint and typing red letters across the face is not enough. Also, too many times I’ve seen plain book covers that are just solid colors with words centered across them – BORING! If you have a computer and you are using Lulu to publish your book, then you also have unlimited access to art, photography, and online programs, a lot of which are free, right at your fingertips on the internet. Lulu does offer cover art and will generate your title and name on the cover for you, but if you are investing in a global package chances are some other book on the market has the same cover art as you. If you aren’t creative or don’t have artistic friends who can help, check the Lulu forums. There are lots of people out there who can help, myself included. I’ve designed over a dozen affordable covers for authors this year.
• Make the most of your Lulu storefront.  It’s not just a place to list your available work.  This is a free webpage where you get to promote yourself and your work, so use it to do that.  This is the area where you can put anything that you had to leave out of the description section of the book page due to length limitations.  If there is something that you feel you want to share with the book buying public such as the acknowledgments we recommend leaving out of the preview, this is the place for it.  If you have a blog, use the RSS block to add your feed.  Use the text and html blocks to add additional information.  Use it to advertise your author website or book website should you have those.  The sky is really the limit – take full advantage!

While attention to the above 10 common boo boos does not guarantee an increase in sales, and still won’t guarantee a review, it will definitely increase your potential for sales and ultimately provide you with a better product to offer. It also strengthens your validity as a serious author.

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