NUTS AND BOLTS OF PUBLISHING YOUR FIRST FAMILY HISTORY BOOK

TOPICS• Traditional Publishing vs. Online Publishing

• Cover Design

• Layout Tips

• Editing Tips

• Final Proof

Disadvantages of Traditional Publishing

• Prepayment of entire order is required

• Inventory storage is your responsibility

• Advertising and marketing is your problem (unless you want to keep a basement full of books)

• Collection and accounting for money is your responsibility

• Substantial financial risk and outlay

• Mistakes cannot be corrected without re-running entire order (at your expense).

• Small orders are outrageously priced on a per-copy basis

• Can take months for printer to finish

• Shipping errors are your problem

• Once the print run is sold out, no one else can purchase a book unless you want to start the process all over

Advantages of Online Publishing• Same files you would submit to traditional printers

• PDF files of interior and book cover

• Uploaded to internet site instead of handed on disc to printer

• Can order a single copy or multiple copies

• No financial outlay

• No room full of books

• Internet site handles all the money, ships all the books, deals with shipping mistakes, and sends you a royalty check

• Mistakes can be corrected at any time

• Faster turnaround time than traditional printers

• Books are always available and never run out, even years after first publication

• Small orders are same price as large orders

• No marketing needed. Customers find you online through search engines

Cover Design• One-piece jpg file that has the same dimensions as the front cover,

back cover, and the spine. Spine width depends on number of pages in book and paper thickness.

Cover Design• Account for bleed area and spine folds when designing the cover.

Cover Design• Hire an online designer to make a cover for you

Layout Tips• Hire a professional to do layout using Adobe InDesign

• Poor-man’s layout if you can afford a professional

• Entire layout in word processor

• All chapters, preface, table of contents start on right side of page

• Add images during layout

• Images tend to move around in word processors

• Add gutter

• Keep margins big enough so that printer doesn’t cut into text

• Full bleed images need to extend to edge of page

• Page numbers usually on outside edge of page

• Double check table of contents numbering

• Look at books you like for layout ideas

• Consider running chapter headers with section breaks

Layout Tips• Add images at 600 dpi or as high as the publisher’s resolution

• Get signed releases to use photos if subject to copyright

• Edit photos for best image

Layout Tips• Create PDF of final layout

• With Adobe Acrobat Professional, PDFCreator, or your word processing software

• Final PDF should match dimensions of final book, including cropping

• Embed all fonts

• Select two-page view in Acrobat to see how final layout will look

Editing Tips• Hire a professional editor if you can afford it

• Use poor-man’s editor if you can’t

• Circulate one print-on-demand copy to family, friends, neighbors

• Ask them to mark up with very visible colored pen

• When finished, make changes from back to front

• Use style manual to correct citations

• Put away for a week and re-read

• Create an index

• Last step in the process, after all the writing is done and edited

• Helps readers quickly find information and ancestors

Final Proof• Carefully review the proof if using a traditional printer. You are

responsible for any errors that you don’t catch in the proof, even if the printer made the errors

• Is using an online service, order one copy as a proof and pass it around for final error check