Publishing has changed in so many ways during my time as a book designer, but one thing remains the same: the basics of good book design and layout.
Book Anatomy: Revisiting Your Book’s Back Matter
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 list could be updated […]
Samples of 2-Column Book Layout
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 columns? Thanks, Pat I’m not sure if there […]
5 Questions on the Book Production and Marketing Matrix
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 later? After all, many new authors have […]
Project Focus: Long and Complex Books Demand Attention to Detail
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, massive amounts of front matter and back matter, separate text streams, lots of tabular […]
“I Hate That!” Book Design Pet Peeves
This is a story about bad book design decisions, and how to avoid them. Jill and I visited Copperfield’s Books in Sebastapol this afternoon. Copperfield’s is a small chain of independent bookstores here in California, and a favorite place to browse their curated selection. As an aside, when you consider all the books that are […]
New! The Book Blueprint: Expert Advice for Creating Industry-Standard Print Books
Announcing the publication of The Book Blueprint, Expert Advice for Creating Industry-Standard Print Books
Book Design: Chapter Openers and Part Openers
I have to confess that my favorite part of book design is creating the chapter opening pages. Ideally the display typography and any other pictorial or decorative elements you use on the chapter opening pages will reflect the type used in the rest of the book, including the title page. In indie books we have […]
Author Series Book Templates: Relive The Glory
Do you have literary heroes? Most writers do. I was thinking about some of my own literary heroes recently, and the books that had made such a big impresssion on me—and millions of other readers. That’s when I realized that I had a unique way to pay these authors and their books a kind of […]
Designing Genre Fiction and New Book Design Templates
Does design influence the readability of books? We introduce 6 new genre-specific pre-designed book templates at BookDesignTemplates.com
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