Kindle Bullet Quirk – Add bullets in Kindle devices

In my last post we covered “How to Add Footnotes To Your eBook” so in this post I would like to tell you about a quirk I found when doing an unordered bullet list when you use a style.css.

You know the type of bullet list I mean:

This is a bullet
This is the second bullet
This is the third bullet

Well if you specify a left margin in your style.css file for the unordered list like this:

ul {margin-left: 10mm; margin-right: 10mm;}
li {margin-left: 15mm; margin-right: 15mm;}

Then when you look at your ebook in a Kindle or a Kindle Fire, the bullet won’t be there.

You can do either of the following in your style.css to make the bullets show up:

Specify a Division (div) having the margins set and no left or right margins in the unordered bullet list style.css. For instance:

div {margin-left: 10mm; margin-right: 10mm;}

And in your ebook.html file you would put:

<div>
<ul><li>This is a bullet</li>
<li>This is the second bullet</li>
<li>This is the third bullet</li></ul>
</div>

This only works if you don’t have any other divisions <div> in your ebook.html file.

Or you can do a class for a bullet in your style.css file:

.bullet {margin-left: 10mm; margin-right: 10mm;}

And then when you would put the following in your ebook.html file:

<div class=”bullet>
<ul><li>This is a bullet</li>
<li>This is the second bullet</li>
<li>This is the third bullet</li></ul>
</div>

So the next time you see your bullets not showing up in the Kindle, it could be because you gave the unordered <ul> list a left margin.

Also the Kindle software ignores the right margin in unordered lists, ordered lists and when you use a blockquote. Very annoying but I like to put the right margin in just in case Amazon does an update allowing it.

P.S. If you like this workaround for your unordered bullet list, then please click the share button on the right so other Authors you know will have this information.

How to add a footnote to your non-fiction ebook

Footnote image with the word note written on the bottom of the foot

There are a lot of different methods for adding a footnote to non-fiction ebooks. None of them are elegant.

Why?

Because most methods require the reader to click on a hyper-linked footnote number, go to the footnote and then press either the back button or another hyperlink to go back to where they were reading.

This totally interrupts their reading experience.

So, when I was formatting an ebook for an Author that had 58 footnotes in his non-fiction ebook, I thought, “There has to be a better way.

It made no sense to me to do the extra work of putting in hyperlinks – one to the footnote and another back to where the person left of reading.

I mean lets get serious, this is the one area where we should not follow the norm of print publishing where footnote(s) can be placed at the bottom of the page.

Helloooooooooooo – there are no pages in ebooks – so footnotes are placed at the end of individual chapters or end of an ebook.

Frankly, this is a bad idea because if you use the hyper-linked end of chapter or ebook method, your reader will see some of them out of context.

Not an elegant solution.

So what is the better way?

I came up with having the footnote be immediately under what was being read like this:

This paragraph is talking about something important and I really want to show I know what I’m talking about so I will reference a book, newpaper article or a magazine article.20

20Judith Tramayne, in her ebook “How to Format a Non-Fiction eBook” June 2012.

And then you would continue on with what you’re writing. By doing it this way your reader does not have to take time away from their reading.

Now the code is done in your .html file and your style.css file. The code is below.

Having a business card for your ebook will help you market your ebook when you’re offline.

Usually offline, people will ask you what you do. Yes you can say you’re an “Author” but then what? Do you just leave it at that or, do you whip out your business card?

You don’t?

Then you are losing sales. People love to brag about “meeting an Author.” So it behooves you to be the one they remember.

And this is done with a business card.

If you write ebooks, you don’t have a physical book to show them so a business card will work instead to increase your credibility in their eyes. You’ve just given them something physical they can slip in their pocket and later when they’re on their computer, they’ll normally go on Amazon, Nook or other e-Reader ebook stores and check you out.

Will they end up buying?