Great post from Writers Beware that is worth a look. The book review and book festival emails have gotten out of control. I am going to record a video on Monday about this but wanted to share in the meantime. https://writerbeware.blog/2026/08/28/production-companies-literary-agents-foreign-languages-ai-driven-scams-continue-to-morph/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_source_platform=mailpoet&utm_campaign=the-latest-post-from-the-writer-beware-blog_154

I have a subscription to Claude AI that I have been using for proof-reading. My book layout is fairly complex. It has tables and text wrapped around smaller images. After trying about 30 PDF to EPUB converters where every tool I tried messed up the layout, I decided on a fixed rather than reflowable file. In the process, I got an education and picked up some new skills. It would have taken me about a day to assemble this file manually. So, I asked Claude if it could do it. After some discussion about strategy, I sent Claude the file. It finished in less than 5 minutes. Claude is about 150 times faster than me. The file works perfectly in the mac Books app and in Calibre and it passed through epubcheck with zero errors or warnings. Epubcheck is the software Ingram uses to validate ebooks. Ingram has accepted this file.The problem was solved for a small part of a $22 per month software fee. Technology will make us all obsolete. And Claude is rapidly becoming my best buddy. Tomorrow when it stops raining here and the noise level drops, hopefully, I will finish training ElevenLabs AI on my voice and get a first cut at my audiobook version.

Wow - 250 years of being a nation. Nothing political here - but a message to all - enjoy the 4th of July celebrations. Hots, hamburgers, steaks, chicken - whatever your fancy. Just remember to be safe and enjoy the festivities. I wish you all a fun filled and exciting day!

If you have any questions, Shane answers them on Monday’s at 10:30 am. He looked at my website and gave feedback and recommendations how to improve it. I join every Monday and listen to the questions and I always learn something new.

The best nonfiction books get people thinking, talking, questioning, or seeing something differently. What are people having conversations about after reading your book?