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+---
+extends: _layouts.post
+section: content
+title: Creating an Ebook With Markdown
+date: 2020-03-30
+description: Use Markdown to Create an Ebook That Can Be Read on Various Devices
+tags: [Markdown]
+---
+
+[Pandoc](https://pandoc.org/) is a great tool for converting a file in one markup format into another. This means we can use it to convert a file written in [Markdown](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markdown) into an [EPUB](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPUB) file that is supported by many e-readers.
+
+Lets start by writting a very simple markdown file called `example_ebook.md`.
+
+```markdown
+---
+title:
+- type: main
+  text: Example Ebook
+- type: subtitle
+  text: An Ebook created from a Markdown file
+creator:
+- role: author
+  text: David Sadler
+publisher: Published by myself
+---
+
+This is an introduction.
+
+# Chapter 1
+
+This is the first paragraph of chapter 1.
+
+This is the second paragraph of chapter 1.
+
+Below is a list.
+
+- Item One
+- Item Two
+- Item Three
+
+# Chapter 2
+
+This is the first paragraph of chapter 2.
+
+This is the second paragraph of chapter 2.
+
+# Chapter 3
+
+This is the first paragraph of chapter 3.
+
+This is the second paragraph of chapter 3.
+```
+
+Note that the file begins with a [YAML metadata block](https://pandoc.org/MANUAL.html#extension-yaml_metadata_block) that starts and ends with three hyphens (`---`). This allows you to specify [EPUB metadata](https://pandoc.org/MANUAL.html#epub-metadata) such as the title and author.
+
+Converting this to EPUB is done by running pandoc.
+
+```shell
+$ pandoc example_ebook.md -t epub3 --toc -o example_ebook.epub
+```
+
+There are several options that need to be passed to pandoc.
+
+- `example_ebook.md` — This argument is the file that you are converting.
+- `-t epub3` — Set the output format to be [EPUB v3 book](https://www.w3.org/community/epub3/).
+- `--toc` — Include a table of contents in the output document. This will be derived from the H1 headers in the markdown.
+- `-o example_ebook.epub` — Tell pandoc to output the conversion to the named file instead of *stdout*.
+
+You can now copy the file `example_ebook.epub` to any device that supports the format or use one of the many software readers such as [Calibre](https://calibre-ebook.com/). However, if you wish to read this on a Kindle device you will need to convert it to the [Mobi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_e-book_formats#Mobipocket) format.
+
+Amazon provides a command line tool called [KindleGen](https://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?ie=UTF8&docId=1000765211) that can convert our EPUB file into the Mobi format. After downloading the tool just run it as shown below.
+
+```shell
+$ kindlegen example_ebook.epub
+```
+
+This will create a file called `example_ebook.mobi` that you can copy to your Kindle to read.
+
+There is a [zip file](/assets/files/example_ebook.zip) available that contains all the example files.