How is a book designed? What do book designers think about as they turn manuscripts into printed books?

Award-winning book designer Richard Hendel says:

As omnipresent as books are, few readers are aware of the “invisible” craft of book designing. The task a book designer faces is different from that faced by other designers. The challenge, says Hendel, isn’t to create something different or pretty or clever but to discover how to best serve the author’s words.

I will be responding to concepts discussed in Hendel’s book, On Book Design, in future posts. I’ll also be introducing other resources that have influenced my approach to book design. I hope to make the craft of book design less invisible, so that authors, readers, and publishers will have a deeper understanding and appreciation of the books they come in contact with every day.

In the meantime, I invite you to read this review of Hendel’s book:

Richard Hendel Book Review

1. Send the designer some sample chapters (Word files) by email.
They don’t have to be the final edited versions. The designer is only working with layout & page design at this point. You can be working on this while the book is being edited. When your final manuscript is ready, the designer can jump in and typeset it right away b/c you’ve already nailed down the design.

2. Send the designer a few sample images, if you have illustrations or photos in your book.
These should be the highest-resolution versions that you have. It’s OK if the files are large – graphic designers usually have a broadband internet connection.

3. Send the designer an image of your book cover – preferably a PDF. Or ask your cover designer to send the latest version.
Have you ever read a book with a cover that didn’t fit visually with the interior? It’s jarring to the reader, even if they might not consciously know why. Good book design should be in service of the content – your writing – and it should make the bookstore visitor want to pick up your book and buy it. That means making sure the interior belongs with the cover.

OK! Now the fun part. The designer will take your Word files and make them look like book pages. Typically, they will approach your book’s interior design in two different ways, and send you two PDFs. Each approach will be uniquely created for your book. The choice of fonts and the placement of design elements will reflect the tone and writing style of your book. The layout will be inviting to your particular audience.

How long does it take?
Setting up the design for your book can take anywhere from 5–10 days, or longer. It varies widely, depending on how many changes need to be made. After you choose one of the initial design approaches, you and the designer will keep tweaking it until you’re happy.

Turnaround time on the design also depends on how complex your page layout is. These things add to the complexity:
• sidebars
• block quotes
• several levels of headings
• part openers as well as chapter openers
• photos and/or illustrations with captions
• charts or tables
• footnotes

In the next article, we’ll talk about setting up a production schedule for your self-published book.

A recent article in The Guardian says it well:

“The visual language of design – the ability to communicate what the book is about, who it is for – is something publishers are all too aware of, as they watch their books do battle on increasingly cluttered bookshop (and supermarket) shelves, competing for our attention and, let’s face it, our money. Images and typography play as great a part in the mind of a potential book buyer than do endorsements on the jackets, be they blurbs from fellow writers, or a sticker from Richard and Judy.”

Read the rest of the article by Susan Tomaselli here

What is POD?
POD stands for Print On Demand, a digital printing technology that allows you to print one book at a time, or a very low quantity of books. Basically, it’s a high-quality, high-speed copier.

I thought POD referred to an online publisher that I could take my book to . . .
A POD publisher uses the POD printing technology to print one copy of your book at a time. In addition, they offer other services that vary from program to program. Some of them put their imprint on your book, and some of them allow you to publish under your own company name. They offer various design services based on templates. You receive a percentage of the sales of your books. They take care of some aspects of book production that an author may not want to do themselves. In my opinion, though, it is very difficult to make a profit when you enter into an agreement with an online POD publisher. Books produced by POD publishers are not respected in the book industry, and they won’t be reviewed by media reviewers.

Isn’t that what self-publishing is, though?
Authors have been self-publishing for a long time. (Virginia Woolf was a self-publisher). You can self-publish by creating your own team and staying in control of all aspects of the production process. In addition to an editor (which you would also need if you went with a POD publisher) you would hire designers for the cover & interior, possibly an illustrator, a proofreader, and an indexer (if needed). You would pay for the printing (your designers could help you choose a good printer). When you hire professional book designers, your book will look as good if not better than those produced by the big publishers. Although you would need money up front to produce your book, you would reap 100% of the profits. The authors I’ve worked with usually cover their production costs with the first print run, and start making a profit after the first reprint.

Can I use a POD printer if I self-publish this way?
Absolutely! There are many excellent POD printers to choose from. The technology has evolved so that the quality is excellent. Most people can’t tell the difference between a POD-printed book and an offset-printed book. The type is crisp and clean, the paper is good, and the full-color cover looks great. Books produced this way are respected in the industry, and media reviewers will review them. You could print a low quantity of books (maybe 25, 100, or 250, or whatever) and reprint as you needed. This way you’d have no storage costs.

What about marketing?
Either way, you’re in charge of marketing your book. The POD publisher may offer some distribution assistance in their package, but they aren’t going to sell your book for you. In fact, even if a small press or publishing company took your book, you’d still have to do a lot of the marketing. If you join PMA, the Independent Book Publishers Association, at http://www.pma-online.org/ you will have access to affordable cooperative marketing programs and distribution assistance to help you get into bookstores. You’ll also have many other member benefits and can share info & networking with other self-publishers. An excellent resource for step-by-step info on book publishing and marketing is Dan Poynter’s Self-Publishing Manual and his website at http://www.parapublishing.com/sites/para/

­I’m launching this blog at midnight on 7/7/07 and nothing has been going right around here. So I thought I’d go with the flow and itemize 7 things that can go wrong with your book if you aren’t careful. Some of them can happen even if you are careful! Why am I adding to your worries? Am I trying to torture you? You’ve been sweating over every word of your book for months, and you’re finally getting ready to publish it, and I come along and tell you horror stories.

Wait! There’s a method to my madness. I’m on your side — I don’t want bad things to happen to your book; in fact, I’m here to help you produce a beautiful, professional-looking book that will sell like crazy.

These 7 things will make you crazy if you don’t work with your designer to head them off. Here’s a list of errors that have shown up in real books by real people (some of the examples are from projects I’ve worked on), followed by best practices to keep them from happening to your book.

1. Title or author name misspelled on the cover
Think that couldn’t possibly happen? Think again! If Ms. Magazine can spell “feminism” wrong on the cover, the rest of us better not get too lackadaisical. It’s easy to miss something so obvious b/c our brains naturally fill in the blanks and we “see” the word as it’s supposed to be. We can learn from other peoples’ mistakes — in this case, Ms. mag — and make sure we proof every single word. Even the words we assume are right.

2. Text reflow
The best way to save time and money is to provide the interior book designer with the final, edited manuscript. If you end up rewriting the text or making substantial edits after the book is typeset, the text will reflow. If, for example, you add two long paragraphs to page 7, the designer must adjust everything from that page until the end of the book. Graphics, charts, and tables must be moved. Chapter openers might also be moved. It can get expensive.

3. Wrong page numbers in the index
This can be avoided by saving the index until the very last. When I work on a book with a client, we go through at least one round of corrections. Sometimes a few rounds are needed to catch all typos and grammatical errors. Sometimes the author needs to rewrite a passage. Text can reflow from one page to the next after a correction is made. If the index is completed before the final corrections are done, it’s possible that the page numbers could end up being wrong in the index. It’s tempting to put the indexer to work before the book is ready, especially when there’s a tight deadline. But an index with the wrong page numbers is worse than no index at all, and you’ll be living with the consequences a lot longer than you’ll remember the delay in deadline.

4. Falling behind schedule
Producing a book is a collaboration of several people — the team includes author(s), editors, proofreaders, designers, possibly an illustrator, a photographer, and the printer. The author may be the production manager, or a designer may fill that role. The key to understanding schedules is this: if one part of the process is delayed or takes longer than planned, the rest of the schedule is also delayed. It’s like dominoes. This may seem obvious, but when you’re in the middle of it, it’s easy to lose sight of this reality and hope that you can still meet the final deadline. Sometimes it’s possible to pick up the slack and get back on track, but it takes clear and open communication to make that happen.

5. Images with the “jaggies”
When the project starts, talk to your designer about your graphics. Send her one or two of your digital images so she can find out right
away if they’ll work. Graphics for print must have a higher resolution than graphics on a computer screen. You can’t take an image from a website and print it unless you don’t care if it’s blurry and pixelated (has the jaggies). Likewise, photos must be scanned at a resolution of 300 dots per inch (dpi) or resized from 72 dpi in a digital camera to 300 dpi. If your eyes are glazing over at this technical stuff, don’t worry. That’s what you hire a designer for.

6. Photos look bad
A good designer will also know how to enhance your photos so they print well. The designer will work with the printer to set up the correct specs on the photo files. One variable is how much the ink soaks into or stays on top of the paper you’ve chosen. Other variables are contrast, tone, brightness, and/or color. Know that you will see proofs from the printer before the book is printed, and if any of the photos are questionable, you can get high-quality proofs of single pages to see exactly how the photos will print.

7. Missing pages
When I was production manager at a small press, we inherited a book with a section missing. The previous staff had the missing section printed and inserted into each book. Fortunately, this has never happened to any projects I’ve worked on. We always go through the printers’ proofs carefully, and would notice any missing pages at that point. If the printer were to make a mistake after we approved the proofs, they would have to reprint the books. I always work with reputable printers that specialize in books, and we have good working relationships. Sometimes a printer will make a mistake — it does happen. It’s how they handle it that’s important.

And how we handle the ups & downs of book production as a team is what’s important. Invest in good people with integrity and experience, and you’ll end up with a book you’ll be proud of.