I’ve recently been writing a series on Book Anatomy for the BookWorks site, and the most recent article just went live last week. In taking the opportunity to revise my own work of about 10 years ago on the Parts of a Book I found a number of places where the...
A bit of miscellany today: Get the “Out” Out When did the word “out” invade the rest of our verbs? It’s everywhere, and deserves to be eliminated. Some examples: Tweet out Report out When did this sneak in? “Out” in these...
Here’s a question from reader Pat B.: Hi Joel, Are there any rules of thumb for deciding whether text on a wide-format page should be printed in one or two columns? And if you go with two, are there guidelines for determining the optimal space between the...
It can be a challenge to explain to new authors that they need to consider their marketing plans before making arrangements for book design and production. They want to know why they can’t just publish the book they want to publish and worry about the rest of it...
Using type ornaments in your book design can add a pleasing pictorial element to your typographic pages. Depending on the tone you’re trying to establish with your design, there’s likely to be a choice of ornaments that will complement the other choices...
Two recent projects have reminded me of just how much attention book designers have to pay to details. With a complex book, every detail counts. What makes a book “complex”? It could be very long manuscripts, books with footnotes, endnotes, annotations,...
