What does a potential buyer notice first in a book? Surely, it is not the summary at the back of the page but the book cover design. Aside from the content, deciding what would appear on the front cover is a crucial stage in the whole process of creating a marketable book. You do not just put anything on it. It must be something that would stimulate the interest of those who see the book and encourage them to get a copy.

As a writer, you may be able to write the best stories and ideas that are worth a good read. But seldom does it happen that the writers themselves create the book cover design. It is still a wise move to let the experts work on this aspect if you are aiming for wide readership. Designers still have the edge when it comes to ideas that would make your book more enticing to the readers’ eyes.

Of course, you may give some suggestions as to the overall design and the designer could work from there. When it comes to technicalities, the experts still have the upper hand on the final design. The layout, fonts, spacing, background and all other aspects have different roles to play in the general impact of the book cover.

The Cover Should Tell Your Story

Just like a gift, the presentation is just as important as the content itself. The way a gift is wrapped adds more thrill and interest. The book cover must work in a similar manner. It must be able to make the book more interesting and appealing to those who see it.

A fascinating cover must contain all the important elements. The graphics, colors, images and every single letter must blend together to make a pleasing depiction of what the book is all about. The cover should also have a single focus rather than distracting.

What’s Hot and What’s Not

A creative and tasteful approach is an effective way to tickle the eyes of book shoppers. It is not surprising that those books with pleasant and appealing covers get to sell more copies than the more plain-looking pieces. People often judge books by what they see on the cover. So your book should be attractive enough in order to make a sale.

Bestsellers do not make it to the top without the necessary time, money and effort spent during the book-making process. If you will look for one thing that is common among books no matter what the genre is, it is the total package that could please readers and leave an unforgettable mark even long after turning the last page. And the book cover design should be something that will get readers to buy the book in the first place.

Wondering how to design your book cover? Let the experts at The Fast Fingers weave their magic. The designers can easily come up with creative and fascinating ideas that will surely help your book become a huge success.

Yes, it is now very easy to publish a book even without the help of so-called illustrious publishers. You don’t have to go through all the stress that writers in the past had to experience. With the internet at your beck and call, you can publish your book any time you want to.

As a writer, you will enjoy a lot of benefits from self-publishing. Here are some of the advantages:

• You will have the chance to decide on the book’s final appearance and the price as well.
• Your book will be made available for your target audience.
• You will have a say on everything involved in publishing which is not the case for traditional publishing methods.

There is a long list of companies that offer print on demand services. Lulu.com is a good example. With this company, you can publish your book, give copies as freebies or you can also sell it for profit. The decision is always yours to make.

Of course, there are also certain drawbacks with self-publishing. The main challenge lies in the process of getting a large readership. A lot of first-class works still remain unread because of inadequate marketing and promotion. First-timers may not be able to reach a good number of their target audience due to poor connections. But this obstacle can be conquered by employing the right promotional strategies.

Cost doesn’t necessarily have to be an issue with self-publishing. Most of the companies that publish books through the internet generally offer both free and paid services. So if budget is an issue, you can always choose to go with the free services instead. Having little or no funds should not deter you from realizing your dream of becoming a published author. There will always be a way for someone who has the courage and the will to turn dreams into reality.

Self-published books can appear more professional if you will try to learn more about the technical side of publishing. Just make it a point to visualize the final product and imagine yourself in the shoes of your target audience. Ask yourself whether the book has the ability to tickle the readers’ interest. The book would have to be professionally and tastefully done to be able to achieve this goal. And if you can get things done the right way, you might be the next bestseller in both online and offline literary marketplace.

If you are planning to get your manuscript published, you can get all the help you need from The Fast Fingers. From book formatting to cover design to other publishing requirements, you can count on our team of experts to deliver high quality of service at all times.

The cost of Print on Demand services may be high for authors without a clue of how to deliver a perfect design for publication. While Lulu will not require upfront payment to publish your book, as an author you bear the responsibility to give it a professional and sellable design. If you are savvy enough, there are certain things you can do to make your book look good or seek professional book formatting services. While self-publishing has made it easier for many authors to achieve their objectives, the standards remain high, meaning that substandard book formatting and design will not suffice here.

Not every idea worth writing about meets acceptable thresholds for publishing. As such, one of the most common quality issues that publishers may have with a manuscript is grammar and punctuation. A great idea may never live to see another day for such quality issues. This makes it critical that you proofread and edit your book to meet acceptable publishing standards. Seek professional editing services and get rid of any punctuation or grammatical errors your manuscript may have before submitting it for publishing.

Page design is another aspect of quality that may call for professional book formatting services. You may seek such help to ensure your book meets specification requirements such as standard page size. For Lulu, 6 X 9 is an acceptable book size. Professionals may help set up the right margins both outside and inside. Other features of your page design such as running headers, headers and footers and their content (including page numbers) must conform to acceptable standards. Many authors may experience no difficulties typing fast, but trouble rears its ugly head when it comes to matters such as setting up a clickable and automatically updatable table of contents, table of figures, section breaks (which are very critical if different sections of your manuscript have to be formatted differently) etc. However, professional paperback formatting has never failed authors in the above regard.

Choice of font also calls for serious consideration. Consider readability as well as your budget and balance those well. Bigger fonts may be legible but will take up more space and in the end more pages. This may increase the costs for publishing your book but at the same time guarantee that your target audience will not have trouble reading your book. Fonts of the serif type such as times give perfect results at sizes 10 or 12 and appear well for many popular books.

It will be very important to come up with a professional cover design for your book. No matter the content of your book, a good cover design can help give your book the attractiveness and competitive edge it needs in the market. Insist on standard resolution for any cover photos. 300 dpi may suffice for a 6 x 9 jpg.

You will need professional help to execute an error free conversion of your manuscript to pdf for Lulu submission. The Fast Fingers book formatting services will give satisfying results for novel to eBook conversion.

Authors usually take time to present their titles in standard formats for publishing with much emphasis going to text components as graphics and images take a back seat, unless the work is predominantly graphical or illustrative. This is understandable, as coming up with text and manipulating it as part of an eBook formatting process is not a science too hard to perfect. On the other hand, creation and design of images for an eBook is an art that calls for talent to get it right. Just like many eBook publishers, BookBaby require certain standards to be met for images before the firm can accept any titles for publishing and distribution via major stores such as IBookstore, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Sony Reader, etc.

Consider the points below if you wish to use BookBaby to publish and distribute your work:

Do not wrap text around images, rather apply in-line images. This puts text above and below an image as opposed to around it and enhances the general appearance of your eBook’s pages.

Make your pictures/ graphics as searchable as possible: One way of accomplishing this is by including a text description of the picture below it.

Ensure submission of supported formats: BookBaby supports PNG and JPG image formats.

Meet maximum image size requirement for all in text images: the maximum image size supported by BookBaby is (600X550) pixels.

Graphics for the cover should be a maximum of (800X550) pixels. Equally important, cover images should be in jpg format only. It may help to seek professional cover design services to avoid any possible complications during conversion processes.

Most BookBaby retail partners will not accept publications with CMYK images. As such, make sure you submit images in RGB only and 72 dpi.

Converting your images: The area of novel to eBook conversion may be tricky sometimes, but the good thing is BookBaby offers conversion services for all the graphical elements of a submitted eBook. In fact, the publishing and distribution house will convert up to 10 graphical elements for every eBook submitted.

Non-image, but nevertheless graphical elements of your eBook: to avoid incompatibility issues with specific eReading devices, all graphical elements of an eBook require standard optimization. Non-image elements such as tables, excel sheets etc are converted into image formats such as jpeg for proper readability on eReaders.

Pictures taken from digital cameras: Sometimes you may wish to include pictures taken through a digital camera in your eBook. These come in RGB color mode and will thus not need any conversion.

Checking color mode of your graphics/images: You may use Adobe Photoshop to check color modes of your images/graphics. Under the image, you can find the mode command where you can check and change the color mode of your files. It is wise that you adjust the color mode of you image files (i.e from CMYK to RGB) before any further manipulation.

While a picture may be worth a thousand words, proper image formatting can do wonders to any piece of literary work. You may engage The Fast Fingers for any picture or book formatting help you may need.

Proliferation of many book publishing and distribution platforms compels authors to approach book formatting with an open mind. As an author, you want to maximize profits by making your book format acceptable to as many publishers and stores as possible. One of the most prominent distributors of eBooks is the Sony Reader and this article goes through some of its book formatting considerations for optimum readability.

To start with, you should know the dimension and other screen attributes of the Sony reader. The page size supported is 3.5” width X 4.82” height. If you are using Ms Word to type your work for later conversion into pdf, ensure to have dimensions set in inches. The Reader supports a screen resolution of 166 DPI, Pixel count of 800 X 600 (SVGA) and Pixel Size of 151 x 153.

Recommended Fonts for the Sony Reader

The Sony Reader will support a variety of font types and sizes though not everything may be suitable for optimal viewing. For clear displaying in PDF format, the most suitable fonts are Arial and Times Roman at 7 points. At 6 points, text may not be clear enough for an easy reading. On the other hand, using fonts at points larger than 7 may result bring about space issues considering the reader has a small screen size.

Optimizing your PDF to Open in the Sony Reader

• You need to have a PDF reader installed in your PC especially one with ability to save files into rich text box or doc formats. You may also use an online service to convert to RTF or doc. Adobe Acrobat is downloadable online and can save files into RTF.
• To convert to RTF or Doc using adobe pdf reader go to File then Save as then RTF in the drop down menu. Give the file a unique name.
• Go to the directory you saved your .txt file and open it with your preferred word processor. Ms Word would suffice here.
• You need to set the correct margins for optimal display on the Sony Reader. If using Ms Word 2007, the margins command is available on the Page Layout tab. Choose customized settings to go straight to the Page Set up box. While here, set margins for bottom, top left and right to 0.15 inches. For Gutter, set a margin of 0.00 and position to Left. Use the paper tab to change the page dimensions to fit within the limits indicated at the beginning of this article (i.e. 3.5” width X 4.82 height). Click Ok to apply the settings.
• Format the text as per your preferences and use standard Font types and sizes. You may click anywhere inside your document and press Ctrl + A to select all text for uniform Book formatting. Apply the font color you want and press Ctrl + S to save your document.
• Convert or Print to PDF using an appropriate converter. Adobe Acrobat is a good converter for the above job.
• Now you can connect the Reader to your PC and transfer your eBook.

For further guidance on book formatting, you may contact The Fast Fingers paperback formatting services.

If you are an author, you can expand your distribution options by having your book listed on the Ipad via iBooks application or the iBookstore. You can optimize the content you prepare in Adobe InDesign for conversion into ePub format, which is the readable version of your book on iPad. If even if you initially planned on a paperback version, you can still tweak your content for conversion to eBook. This article goes through the basic book formatting processes before converting your book into a valid ePub file.

The concise steps below will help convert your InDesign content into ePub format for listing on iBookstore:

• Export the Adobe InDesign file to ePub
• Add the file to the iBooks application on your iPad so you can preview and test it
• You may now have you book listed on iBookstore by either:
• Opening an account with iTunes connect, so you can upload your eBook directly to Apple (i.e. if already approved)
• Create an account with a third party such as BookBaby, who may then upload the ePub file to iBookstore on your behalf.
• Tips for eBook formatting before exporting to ePub format

Set up your document in InDesign and add all the text and images.

Layout

It is advisable you set up all your text frames as a single thread in the order you wish to appear in the converted ePub file.

Styling

After conversion to ePub, InDesign retains basic text formatting by generating a CCS file that keeps track of character and paragraph styles. You may then tweak the CCS file after conversion to yield the styling you want for your final eBook.

Chapters

If you anticipate having a long book of over 300kb, it may suffice if you separate book chapters into independent InDesign files.

Fonts

If you want to embed all the fonts in your InDesign document, use the Digital Editions Export Options dialog box and select “include Embeddable Fonts” in the CSS options. However, iBook does not support font embedding although it gives readers the options to view text in a variety of other standard fonts.

Images

For ePub, you will need to convert images to GIF or JPEG. Optimizing of your images will depend on the version of InDesign you are using. InDesign CS5 automates the conversion process for optimized images to display properly and avoid memory complications. If using CS3 and CS4, you have to convert manually and reduce size by downsampling.

Meta Data

Meta Data defines information about the file itself and remains in the converted ePub file for use by software and eReader devices. You add Meta Data in the InDesign file before starting the conversion process. The data primarily includes title of the book. You may also add author name, keywords, copyright info etc.

Book formatting and optimizing for the best viewing of your title on an eReader may call for technical knowledge that’s not in the domain of many aspiring authors. However, The Fast Fingers will always standby to help with any issues you may have regarding book formatting, conversion to PDF or ePub etc.

Book formatting is the presentation aspect of your writing and thus merits careful planning. Authors know that no matter how sweet their story sounds, readers will base their first judgment on how it looks. The following general guidelines can help writers avoid common book formatting pitfalls.

Size of source document

Always upload an appropriate size of source document. This means that the size of your source document should be based on the media it will be published on. For Instance, if you intend to publish on Lulu and upload an 8.5 X 11 document, the size of both text and images will scale down significantly when you select 6 X 9 as the book size. You will also have to consider the available book sizes and specifications for bleed if you need images, lines, colors or other graphical elements to stretch to the edge of the page.

Page orientation

Use portrait page orientation as opposed to landscape, especially if you’ll be using Print on Demand distribution option. POD printers may not yield good results with landscape pages and as such, you should use the portrait page orientation even for wide format books.

Use standard fonts

The temptation to use fancy fonts may be difficult to resist. However, professional writers use standard fonts as these guarantee that the printed output turns out as expected. Fonts such as Times New Romans and any other Microsoft Windows default fonts may suffice. If you have to use hard-to-find and non-standard fonts, which may lose their characteristics upon conversion, you should consider having a print-ready PDF for submission to your publisher. You can achieve this by embedding all fonts before converting to PDF.

Graphics/images

There are various publishing houses and media with varying procedural requirements for submission of images and graphics. Some publishers will require that you embed all graphics and images to the document with the rest of the content. Generally, optimize the images for screen viewing and printing. The optimal resolution for images on PDF is 300 dpi.

Page numbering for POD

Odd numbered pages should be on the right of your book. It follows that, printing does not take place on the inside of the front and back pages and as such, your first page begins on the right.

Vertical spacing, tabs, and styles

If using layout applications, apply styles as opposed to local formatting. Applying styles for the entire documents makes it easier to effect or track any changes. Additionally, do not use tabs for horizontal spacing or paragraph return for vertical spacing.

Page and section breaks

Use page breaks to separate chapters. Make appropriate use of section breaks to have the freedom to apply different formatting on sections of your book. For instance, numbering of pages before chapter one should be different from that of the body of your novel. Sections break will help you achieve that with ease.

Cover design

Take into consideration specifications given for cover design. The cover page is designed as an image and thus, should meet minimum size and resolution requirements.

For further technical details of book formatting, talk to The Fast Fingers now!

A navigable TOC is one of the most critical eBook formatting features any title must have to enhance the reader experience. Since a TOC can only be added before successful conversion to ePub, it is necessary that as an author you enlist professional book formatting services especially during the process of in design to ePub Conversion.

You want to set up your document so that upon conversion to ePub, it opens with a navigable table of content to the left. Any eReader will look for the TOC in your eBook once it opens up. The TOC headings appearing on the left may then be clicked so that the eReader jumps automatically to the associated content in the document.

Setting up an Adobe InDesign TOC for a single document with several chapters

Adobe InDesign has a perfect TOC feature you can employ before converting to ePub. The way this works, you do not add the TOC to the InDesign document; rather, you apply an InDesign TOC style that’s used to determine creation of navigation links in the TOC. Follow the steps below to set up the TOC style for your document:

1. For starters, determine where you want your navigable eBook chapters to start. Then, make sure to distinguish each chapter start with a specific paragraph style. This helps InDesign to distinguish chapter headings and starts from the rest of the text and objects in the document. Apply the Subhead paragraph style to all headings that mark the start of new chapters in your document. It is important that you apply the same paragraph style to chapter headings on the same TOC level.

2. Through the layout menu, click the Table of Contents Styles to bring up the Table of Contents Styles dialog box

3. Click on the ‘New’ button to create a new TOC from scratch. The New Table of Contents Styles dialog box comes up. Give the new TOC style a unique name, say “epub”. You do this by editing the TOC Style textbox, which by default reads “TOC Style 1”.

4. Under the “Other Styles” section, choose the Subhead option (this is the style you’ve already applied to the chapter starts). Click on the “Add” command, which is available to the left of the Other Styles section. The new style automatically appears in the “Include Paragraph Styles” section.

5. Click OK.

At this stage, the TOC style has already been added and appears in the list of Styles available as indicated in the Table of Contents Styles dialog box. However, you have not yet told InDesign to use it. For now, click Ok to close the box.

1. You tell InDesign to apply the TOC style as you convert your document to ePub. You use the file menu to export, where a “Save As” dialog box comes up. Save the document to bring up the “Digital Editions Export Options” dialog box.

2. Click on the Contents menu item, and on the EPUB Contents panel to the right, check (select) the “Include TOC entries” box.

3. Under TOC style, choose epub, which is the name you gave to your TOC Style.

4. Also, select “Suppress Automatic Entries for Documents” and “Use First Level Entries as Chapter Breaks”.

5. Export

At this stage, your eBook already has a navigable TOC.

The Fast Fingers book formatting services can help you with the creation of a more complex but navigable TOC for your eBook.

Most of the novels and reading materials we have saved in our laptops are eBooks. You may be so disorganized that you just save your eBooks as documents or PDF files with no arrangement whatsoever. There are instances where some of those eBooks may just get lost in your computer which prompts you to download them again wasting more of you time. I guess it’s about time we introduced, Calibre, a software to help you organize your eBooks. So how can you use this software to organize your eBooks?

Calibre can support 22 ebook formats and can convert them into 16 format outputs for ebook reader devices such as Nook, Kindle etc. You can download Calibre for any operating system whether Mac, Windows etc. Once you have downloaded Calibre for your computer you can install it and start using it to organize your eBooks. Create some space in any drive in your computer where you can store all the eBooks together with all the necessary information with regard to each eBook. Depending on what eBook reader you use, Calibre will convert all the eBooks into that set format to help you read your eBooks with ease. You can also use Calibre to send eBook information to your eBook reader email or whatever else you want to do. You can add eBooks to your Calibre set up or download eBooks online and add them. Once they are saved in Calibre, they are organized and now you have easy access to your eBooks.

Calibre is actually one of the best eBook applications since there is automatic conversion of eBooks into required formats, organization etc. You can also use our book formatting services offered to self-published authors at cheap rates.

As our world moves in a pace which is faster than a lightning bolt, it also adapts to the changes which technology has to offer. What was once an activity only done by running the fingers on the leaves of a book and flipping through its pages, it can be done now by just simply tapping/swiping ones fingertips against a screen of genius possibilities. eBooks, eReaders, ebook formatting- these have made the revolution of literature even more interesting and incredible.

 Thousands of today’s authors are considering electronic book formatting as a decent option to get their books in the mainstream. Why not? This world is all about digital stuff now. The rule of the thumb nowadays is that the more digital it is; the more famous and top billing it is. If you are one of those who are deeply interested in this type of book publishing, this article is informative for you.

It is not as intimidating as it may seem.

 What many authors know about electronic book formatting is that it is a very complicated process and a more expensive one too. Well, the truth is that it is not. While e-book formatting may come in with particular skills, it is relatively easier than looking for traditional publishers who won’t reject your manuscript for the first, second and nth time. There are many book formatting services now being offered if you want to get self-published. You can check The Fast Fingers for affordable service and brilliant publishing ideas. 

The key here is to get help. Ask for it and you will definitely receive assistance. The least you can do is to worry about your lack of skills and knowledge on creating quality e-books. It’s fine. You are one busy creature, writing and editing a lot of materials. You should focus on your novel a whole lot more. Let the book formatters do their job. They are professionals in their own field of expertise.

 The way you present your book is the way you present yourself.

 Yes, just how important the role of your face is in presenting yourself to the world, it also applies well to your book cover. The cover of a book can make or break the book itself. It is one of the most important dimensions of your book because it is what attracts your readers in the first place. If you don’t have the knowledge on Photoshop or making the cover lay-out using any similar software, you just have to feed your publishers on your ideal book cover and they gladly do it for you. The key here is an open line of communication between you and the publisher or book formatter. Together you can create a very impressing, striking and eye-catching book front.

 You deserve the best font.

 Many authors are advised to have the KISS (keep it short and simple) principle in book layouts and in using fonts for the text. Well, it is your book. Remember that whatever suggestions your publishers throw on you, you will always have the last say on what color of fonts to use, what type of fonts to utilize or whether what style of typography should be put in the book.

 You are paying for everything so unless you are really doing everything by yourself, you should not compromise the quality of your book’s text for anything else.

 Be the best, settle for the best.

 Not because you have one self-publishing company clamoring for your attention automatically means you will have to settle for the services they offer. Look for the best people to work with. This having been said, look for a self-publishing company who knows exactly what they are doing in the business. This is your book; the product of your honest and dedicated labor. Why settle for anything less?