Sample: Book Listing Package

Prepared by: Hatchling Media for Tradewinds Brief Services (rehearsal copy, demonstration manuscript) Book: The Cartographer’s Debt · standalone fantasy · approx. 5,700 words (demonstration length) Author-supplied facts used: genre (low fantasy, nautical), content level (clean, mild peril), standalone with a planned companion novella

0. Facts used and their status

1. Book description

The sea forgives a liar once. Never twice.

In the harbor city of Varre, mapmakers are trained from childhood to draw the shore as it is, not as they wish it. Ysolde Ferrant was the worst apprentice of her year at everything except the one thing that matters: looking. She can stand on a headland for an hour and draw it so truly that a blind pilot could sail it.

She can also lose everything with a single letter.

The Guild of the Salt Reach has called in her debt: four hundred crowns she will never have. Guildmaster Brannoch offers a way out. Bring him a true chart of the Unmapped Mile by the new moon, and the debt is paid. Fail, and the Guild takes her workshop, her license to draw, and Ottilie, the orphaned apprentice who has become the closest thing Ysolde has to family.

No one has ever charted the Unmapped Mile. Its coves shift overnight. Its sandbars wander. Ships that sail by its maps run aground on reefs that were not there the day before.

With a smuggler who knows every rock north of the city, and his reclusive brother who has watched the Mile from a lighthouse for twenty years, Ysolde climbs to the lamp room night after night to study a coast that refuses to hold still. What she discovers there will change what a map can be, and put her on a collision course with the most powerful man in Varre.

Because the Guild does not really want a map. It wants a toll road. And the truth Ysolde finds on that shifting coast, a truth about wanting and seeing and the price of a single wishful line, may cost far more than four hundred crowns to put on paper.

The Cartographer’s Debt is a short, atmospheric fantasy of salt, ink and stubborn honesty, about the courage to draw the world as it truly is. Clean read: no explicit content; mild peril.

For readers who love quiet, clever fantasy with a strong heroine, a found family, and a satisfying final turn.

1b. KDP-formatted description

Complete and ready to paste. Use this version only in a description box that accepts HTML; otherwise paste the plain text from section 1. Same words as section 1, with the opening line set in bold. 1,942 characters including tags (KDP maximum 4,000).

<p><b>The sea forgives a liar once. Never twice.</b></p>
<p>In the harbor city of Varre, mapmakers are trained from childhood to draw the shore as it is, not as they wish it. Ysolde Ferrant was the worst apprentice of her year at everything except the one thing that matters: looking. She can stand on a headland for an hour and draw it so truly that a blind pilot could sail it.</p>
<p>She can also lose everything with a single letter.</p>
<p>The Guild of the Salt Reach has called in her debt: four hundred crowns she will never have. Guildmaster Brannoch offers a way out. Bring him a true chart of the Unmapped Mile by the new moon, and the debt is paid. Fail, and the Guild takes her workshop, her license to draw, and Ottilie, the orphaned apprentice who has become the closest thing Ysolde has to family.</p>
<p>No one has ever charted the Unmapped Mile. Its coves shift overnight. Its sandbars wander. Ships that sail by its maps run aground on reefs that were not there the day before.</p>
<p>With a smuggler who knows every rock north of the city, and his reclusive brother who has watched the Mile from a lighthouse for twenty years, Ysolde climbs to the lamp room night after night to study a coast that refuses to hold still. What she discovers there will change what a map can be, and put her on a collision course with the most powerful man in Varre.</p>
<p>Because the Guild does not really want a map. It wants a toll road. And the truth Ysolde finds on that shifting coast, a truth about wanting and seeing and the price of a single wishful line, may cost far more than four hundred crowns to put on paper.</p>
<p>The Cartographer’s Debt is a short, atmospheric fantasy of salt, ink and stubborn honesty, about the courage to draw the world as it truly is. Clean read: no explicit content; mild peril.</p>
<p>For readers who love quiet, clever fantasy with a strong heroine, a found family, and a satisfying final turn.</p>

2. Keywords (one phrase per KDP keyword box)

1. nautical fantasy short read
2. mapmaker cartographer fantasy heroine
3. clean fantasy no romance
4. found family fantasy apprentice
5. coastal magic sea fantasy
6. guild intrigue fantasy debt
7. cozy low fantasy novella

Each phrase is under 50 characters. To be checked against the live KDP form’s limits at delivery.

3. Category placements (KDP picker paths)

1. Science Fiction & Fantasy › Fantasy › Action & Adventure
2. Science Fiction & Fantasy › Fantasy › Coming of Age
3. Literature & Fiction › Action & Adventure › Sea Adventures

Verification record (the one verified example required before launch):

All three paths were shown in the picker as “Kindle Books › …” with “3 out of 3 category placements selected” (screenshot held on file). The selection was made only to confirm that the paths exist.

4. Back-matter copy

Thank you for reading The Cartographer’s Debt.

If Ysolde’s chart stayed with you, a short review helps other readers find their way to Varre.

Coming soon: [proposed — author to confirm] a companion novella from the Hall of Charts, following Ottilie’s first commission as a journeywoman. Title to be announced.

Never miss a release: [proposed — author to confirm] join the author’s newsletter at [newsletter link] (the author replaces this with their signup address).