Book design has been part of my roster of design services for quite some time. The book publishing industry has seen some incredible changes over the past 20+ years since the first book cover design project came my way. Back then, the size of the book was all I needed to design a cover. Unless an author was lucky enough to have a book pre-released as a hardback and then soft cover, or even more elaborate, as a box set, I simply had one final layout for a cover. Self-publishing was rare. Publishing houses were the places authors found the greatest successes and financial gains for their manuscripts if they were lucky enough to get into one. It was (and still is) like winning a lottery to get published. Making it onto the NYT’s list or being awarded some other esteemed recognition was like winning the mega millions lottery.
The early days of book design simply involved the front and back cover followed by the design of the book’s spine (which isn’t completed until the final page count of the book’s interior determines the final spine width—every signature of pages added changes the width of the spine). There weren’t a lot more basic needs for a cover design beyond that.
These days, there are so many choices for an author. They can work with small boutique publishers; self-publish exclusively with Amazon; use another self-publishing platform like Ingram Spark; sign with an agent who not only believes in the manuscript but can also shop it around to publishers; and the most rare of all of these, to get a manuscript picked up by big name publisher and make it to the local book store.
Now there’s a world of diversity out there when it comes to publishing. Add that diversity to the various genres of books alongside each author’s individual take on a subject and one can apply the saying, “if you’ve read one book about “xyz,” you’ve read just one book about “xyz.” Ultimately, the possibilities are endless.
I love working with authors and I love working with publishers. Both have their specific approaches to a book’s design process. Occasionally it’s a friend’s book I work with but most of the time it’s a near or complete stranger’s book. Sometimes, I don’t ever even meet the author or publisher. My longest relationship with a well-known publisher came about after a sharing a friendly cup of tea with the editor in another state that I never visited again afterwards. That relationship was one which provided great pride in the notoriety of authors. I’m forever grateful for that fateful cup of tea.
Alternately, for one of my biggest self-published book projects, I didn’t meet one of the co-authors until after many months of our close work together. I’m equally proud of that project and not just because it came about because of a referral from another client. The work we developed was solid.
These days I’m more likely to work with self-publishing authors who have the vim and vigor to back up their promotions and sales following all the hard work that goes into actually producing a book. And it’s definitely a lot of work! It can take months to complete a book once the manuscript is completed. It includes not only the design of the cover and interior for print, but also for the e-book, audio book and any other promotional graphics necessary to get the word out.
One of my latest book projects, written by Chérie Newman, included not just the cover and interior design for the print version, but also an illustration for the cover, the full scroll-able eBook file, cover art for an audio book and likely some other promotional artwork to come. I had a blast working on this one!
Sometimes, I even get to embrace my love of creating illustrations for a book. An illustration can tell the story of a book’s title that doesn’t necessarily spell everything out. If the title simply said, “Do It In the Kitchen” you might be confused about the subject matter without an illustration and the subtitle spelling out what exactly it is that you can do in the kitchen. The title is the attention grabber and the subtitle and illustration tell you it’s more than you might initially think.
That’s what I love about working on books: like every design project, it’s a collaboration with a mutual mission to get people’s attention in a positive way—to inform, inspire and share ideas.
So those books your read, whether held in your hands on on your devices, likely have years of passion and determination involved before it actually makes it into your periphery of awareness. I love books and I love the small part I get to play in the process of their birthing.