"Roundheads and Ramblings"
publishing
|
Posted on Thursday, May 03, 2012 1:50 PM
This week we will celebrate the 187th birthday of Laura Matilda Town, who just happens to be the main character in my next book, The Road to Frogmore. Laura was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on May 3, 1825, the middle child in a large family; she had a brother and two sisters who were older than she was, and a brother and two sisters who were younger. Her mother died when Laura was nine--a tragedy that left its mark on all of her children, and particularly on Laura. As she admits at one point in the book, she always felt responsible for her mother's death. Maybe, if she had just been a better child, she thought, her mother wouldn't have tried to give birth to a new baby.
Laura grew up to be an unconventional woman. She was a Unitarian in an era of evangelical fervor. She studied to be a doctor, when women doctors were still a rarity. She refused to marry, in an age when every woman was expected to become a dutiful wife. Instead, she set up her own household with her lifelong companion, Miss Ellen Murray. But nothing she did was more outrageous than her decision to travel to South Carolina in the middle of the Civil War so that she could bring medical care and education to the slaves who were just learning that they were going to be free.
Her efforts on behalf of the people she came to know on St. Helena Island did not stop when the war was over. She felt responsible for all the evils of slavery, which was not surprising, given her character, and she refused to abandon the people she had come to love. Instead, she and Ellen bought a former plantation right there on the island, and built a school financed entirely from Laura's own inheritance. The two women adopted several black children and raised them as their own. They continued to teach for the rest of their lives. They provided an education that was the equivalent to (or perhaps better than) the state-provided education of white children. Laura died on St. Helena Island in 1901, and Ellen followed her in 1908.
Their school, however, outlived them. Known first as The Penn School, so named in honor of the Freedmen's Aid Society of Pennsylvania, it has evolved today into The Penn Center, whose purpose is the preservation of the Gullah language and heritage of the people of St. Helena Island. This year, you will note, is the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Penn School, and the Penn Center will be honoring Miss Towne and her amazing contributions to the welfare of the people she helped to transform from slaves into citizens. So happy birthday, Laura. We're still trying to live up to your ideals.
|
|
|
Posted on Tuesday, July 19, 2011 9:57 AM
The announcement that Borders is closing brought back several memories. And yes, I realize these are going to date me. So let's stipulate from the beginning: I'm old (but I haven't stopped welcoming change).
 1. It was 1981, and I had just finished typing my master's thesis, using an electric typewriter, but still struggling with the need to produce three letter-perfect carbon copies. Do you remember what a pain that was? No strike-overs allowed, and erasures needed to be invisible. All footnotes went at the bottom of the page, not the end, and, believe me, a thesis in medieval history has a LOT of footnotes. We had an elaborate system of typing all footnotes first, so we could tell how many lines each one would take. Then, armed with the knowledge of how many lines were available within the margins of a page, we stopped every time a footnote number appeared in the text. We counted the separating line, the space before the note, and the number of lines in the note itself -- then subtracted that number from the number of lines available for text. Type another footnote number on the same page? Stop and recalculate. When a fellow student told me about a new-fangled invention called a word processor that would allow text changes and copy making without erasers and carbon paper, it sounded like just another impossible dream.
 2. It was 1985, and I was ready to start working on my doctoral dissertation. My supportive and understanding husband bought me a brand new IBM desk computer. It had a memory of only 256K, used 5-inch floppy disks, and sported a black screen with glowing green letters, but it was beautiful. Out went the electric typewriter, in came the computer, and I never looked back. But within the university, and particularly in the English department, I heard discussions about the damage computers were going to do to research. "How will we know what an author really wrote," scholars were asking, "if we can't see the handwritten manuscripts and the changes he made?"
3. It was 1991, and I was a full-fledged assistant professor of medieval history at a small liberal arts college. I was very excited that year to be helping to sponsor a traveling exhibit of 10th and 11th-century manuscripts from the Monastery of St. Gall. A friend and I were co-lecturing in a class on monasticism to go along with the exhibit. A student brought me a cartoon showing several monks standing around a copy machine, with a caption reading, "It's a miracle." The cartoon was an obvious take-off on the current ad campaign being run by the Xerox company, but I kept it taped to the door of my office until the tape cracked and the edges of the paper curled up and started to flake away.
 Life seemed to be getting simpler all the time, and fewer and fewer of us were questioning what was being lost in the process. I certainly wasn't.
4. It was the year 2000 -- the turn of a century -- and people were worried about the consequences of changing from the 19s to the 20s. What would happen to all those printed checkbooks, invoices, order forms, and account statements with a blank space for the date that looked like this _______________, 19___? There was near panic over the possibility that on January 1, 2000, computers would crash and lose all their records because they had not been programed to handle the dates of the 21st century.We adapted, or course, but a bit of nostalgia began to creep in. One contest asked, "What was the most important invention of the past 1000 years?" The run-away winner? Gutenberg's printing press, which made books available to ordinary people.
5. And now it's 2011, and we're witnessing the decline of bookstores, publishers, and paper-based publications of all sorts. Book store chains like Borders are closing, newspapers are folding (not meant as a pun!), magazines are shrinking , and electronic editions of books are outselling printed versions by a wide margin. Earlier this week and friend and fellow blogger asked if it was worth it any longer to publish bound versions of our books. I confess, I don't know. I have a carton of trade paper books sitting here in my closet, while checks from Kindle keep rolling in every month.
This "Reading Bear" from Borders sits in my office, reminding me that for a thousand years or more, the very word "scholar" meant one who read books. Have we lost that notion? Or is this just another "miracle," one that will open up another world of ideas? What do you think?
|
|
|
Posted on Tuesday, July 12, 2011 8:36 AM
I'm reposting a small dictionary of printing terms. Joel Friedlander published this originally last month, and I found it extremely helpful. Perhaps it will help you, too.
The Language of the Book, Part I
Ascender/descender—Descenders
are parts of letters that extend below the baseline
as in the “tail” of the letters “y” “g” or “p” while ascenders are the parts of
letters that rise above the height of lower case letters, like the
upward-extending parts of the “l” “h” or “t”.
Baseline—The
imaginary line on which type, not including the bits that go below the line,
like the tail of the lower-case “g” or “p”.
Bleed—When an
image or type is intended to run off the edge of the printed page, it is said
to “bleed.” Printers have their own specifications for how far the image has to
extend past the edge of the paper to allow enough room for manufacturing variances.
In offset printing it is standard to allow one-eighth inch for bleed. Some
digital printers, due to the looser manufacturing standards of their equipment,
require one-quarter of an inch for bleed.
Blind folio—A page
number that is assigned to a page but not printed on the page.
Book block—The
complete interior of a book after the individual signatures have been printed fooled and gathered together and
before being covered with a paper cover or hardcover case.
Bulking—The
measurement of paper thickness expressed as how many pages it takes to equal
one inch, as in “360 ppi” or 360 pages per inch. Lower ppi will create a
thicker book, a higher ppi, a thinner one.
Bullet—A
typographic character used to bring emphasis to items, often in a list, and
therefore called a bullet list.
Casebound—Hardcover
books are created by manufacturing a case from binders board and a covering such as cloth, leather or paper, then
covering the book block with the
case. In the bindery this is known as “casing in” and results in a casebound
book.
CMYK, RGB—Different
ways of representing color, CMYK is used in printing and creates colors through
a combination of cyan, magenta, yellow and black inks. RGB is used for screen
displays and creates colors through a combination of red, green and blue
pixels. Materials prepared for printing usually need to be in the CMYK color
space.
Colophon—A notice,
usually at the end of a book, that credits the design, typography and
production of the book.
Crop marks—Lines on
artwork, either digital or mechanical, intended to show where the reproductions
should be cut to achieve the final trim size.
Double truck—An image in
a book or magazine that extends over two pages and across the gutter.
DPI—The amount
of information contained within an image file is expressed as dots per inch. Screen images are usually
displayed at 72 DPI on monitors, but printers typically require images of 300
DPI to produce acceptable results.
Folio—This is
what we call page numbers in books. Folio is a term derived from early
printing. Thus, page numbers at the bottom of a page are referred to as drop folios and pages without page
numbers might be referred to as using blind
folios (you can’t see them but they are implied.) After adding page numbers,
we might say the pages are foliated.
Grayscale—The color space for black and white graphic
images. For book interiors intended to be printed only in black, all graphics
should be grayscale.
Gutter,
margin—Margins are the blank spaces around the type area on a book page,
but the inside margin has the special name gutter
and it is always the margin on the bound edge of the book page. When you’re
looking at a book page spread you’ll
have two gutters together, doubling
the apparent space. Keep that in mind when laying out your book page.
Imposition—Not
something being forced on you. Books are usually printed on large sheets of
paper which are subsequently folded several times and then assembled and
trimmed on the outside edges. The arrangement of pages on the large sheets is
the imposition, and before computers it was the responsibility of specialists
who could figure out which page should go where.
Justification—Describes
how the left and right edges of a block of type are arranged by the typesetter.
Flush left type is even on the left
margin and ragged on the right edge
as a standard amount of space is used between each word and lines are allowed
to end wherever, creating a “ragged” appearance. Flush right is the opposite. Justified
typesetting varies the amount of space between words (and sometimes between
letters) to create straight margins on both the left and right sides of a block
of type.
Kerning—The
adjustment of the inter-letter spacing of in typesetting to account for the
shapes of the letters and to make the type appear to be uniformly spaced.
Leading—Quite
simply the measurement of space between the lines of type, usually measured
from one baseline to the next.
Ligature—Another
carryover from the work of scribes before typesetting was invented, ligatures
join two letters together where the forms of the letters would otherwise create
an awkward inter-letter spacing problem. Frequently used for “fi” “fl” and
similar combinations.
Page, leaf,
spread—Different ways of describing the book page. A page is one side of a leaf
of paper. The basic unit of design in printed books is the spread, or two facing pages as you see them when a book is opened
flat. In ebooks, the spread has become obsolete, since ereaders simply create
pages on the fly and there is no “open book” as with a printed book.
Pagination—Dividing a
book into pages, and the assigning of page numbers (folios) to the pages in a
specific style of numbering.
Pica, point—The
printer’s standard unit of measure for typography and layout. The pica is now
standardized as one-sixth of an inch. There are 12 points in every pica. Used
most commonly to denote type size and leading,
as in “12 point Minion on 15 points leading.”
Running
head/running feet—Page elements that show the reader where they are in
the book, running heads (at the top of the page) or running feet (at the bottom
of the page) can include the book title, author name, part title, chapter title
or subject headings to provide navigational help to the reader.
Safe area—Designated
by a book printer, the area that is far enough away from the trim or gutter
edges to be considered “safe” within the tolerances of the printer’s
manufacturing equipment.
Serif, sans
serif—Typefaces that evolved from calligraphic originals still show the
influence of scribes writing with square-nibbled pens in the little serifs, or
finishing strokes of the letters. Type designs without these flourishes are
sans serif, (from the French).
Signature—Books are
printed in multiples of 8, 16 or 32 pages on large sheets of paper. Once the
paper has been printed and folded to the size of the book it becomes a
signature. If the sheets hold 16 pages, we refer to the book as being printed
in “16-page signatures.”
Tracking—An
adjustment offered by typesetting programs that adjusts the overall spacing
between letters. Looser tracking is often used for smaller type or type set in
small caps. Tighter tracking is common in larger type sizes like those used for
headlines.
Trim size—Books are
printed on large sheets which are then folded into signatures. The signatures are gathered to create the book block which is then trimmed on the
top, bottom and the opening side. Thus the final size of the book is called the
trim size. Although a book can be produced in any size, printers and trade practice
mostly use standard trim sizes for economy.
Widow/orphan—The first
or last line of a paragraph left at the bottom or stranded at the top of a
page, usually considered an aesthetic defect in better typography.
http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2011/06/dont-let-me-find-you-bleeding-in-the-gutter-understanding-book-terminology/
|
|
|
Posted on Tuesday, May 10, 2011 11:11 AM
 One of the first articles in my mailbox this morning was one by Dana Lynn Smith, The Savvy Book Marketer: "Why I Finally Bought a Kindle -- And You Should Too." I smiled, because it reminded me of a conversation I had this past weekend at a gathering of academics. One of them asked me how sales were going for Beyond All Price. I said they were slow but steady, and then commented that the Kindle version was selling particularly well.
There was a moment of shocked silence. Now, I should have been prepared for that. I know these people pretty well, and I understand that they are all book people. I've been in their offices and seen the shelves weighted down with their personal libraries. Then the conversation went something like this:
"There's a Kindle edition? Are you happy about that?" "Of course I am. I set it up." "But . . . a Kindle? Do you actually have one?" "I've had one for several years. I love it." "But . . . it's not a real book." "Of course it is. These days I don't read anything else." "Oh." Skeptical looks, arched eyebrows, sighs, shrugs, and obvious dismissal followed.
 Here's what we DIDN"T say, because we really like each other and respect our collegiality:
THEM: "Oh, you poor old thing. This is what happens when you retire. You just lose your academic standards and focus." ME: "No, you're thinking like a Luddite! E-books are the wave of the future. I love old books, too, but there are untold advantages to electronic editions. You need to emerge from your book-lined cubbyhole now and then and see what's happening on the outside."
I don't want to go back over all the selling points for Kindle. You can find those all over the web, including in Dana's post mentioned above. But here's what particularly appeals to an old retired academic.
1. Ease of use. I've put in my years of carting loads of books everywhere I went. The Kindle fits in my purse and only adds ounces to its weight. When I'm reading a hefty volume, my arthritic thumbs no longer protest at the weight of the book itself, and the pages don't need a steady grip. I can hold the Kindle in one hand, or prop it on my knee.
2. Affordability. New books, even best sellers, are available for under $10.00, and some are ridiculously low-priced. After today, my own Beyond All Price can be had for $5.99. I've also published 2 small e-books, one on Civil War cooking and the other on Civil War medical treatments. They're both downloadable at $2.99. A Scratch with the Rebels, the history of the Roundhead Regiment that sold at $24.95, is now only $9.95 in the Kindle Bookstore. And then there are the classics. Books that are out of copyright are not only readily available but usually free. You can download a whole set of Shakespearean drama or Agatha Christie mysteries without spending a dime. You don't even have to pay a shipping charge.
3. Space availability. When we moved into our new but downsized house, many wonderful books ended up in cartons in the garage or on a sale rack at the library. We simply did not have room for the collection that used to line my office walls. But my Kindle? It can hold 3,500 books, every one of them available instantly when I want a particular volume.
4. Convenience. No, I haven't lost my love of reading. I read more now than I ever did. On a beach? Sure. Sunlight, ocean breezes, and sand are no problem. On a plane? Of course. No plugs or cords needed, and no extra space in the carry-on bag. In a dentist's waiting room? A Kindle book is much better than a ragged magazine from 2005.
5. Transfer ability. The greatest benefit, for me, comes from the Kindle App. It is available free for tablet readers, smart phones, and desktop computers. I have a copy on every one of my electronic gadgets, and they all synch automatically. I can start reading on the Kindle, do a bit more on my iPhone in a boring meeting, read another chapter in my office while waiting for a computer program to update itself, and finish a suspenseful story on my lighted iPad in the middle of the night. Kindle keeps track of my place, no matter which device I'm using. No more dog-eared pages or bookmarks lost to devilish cats who love to pull them out of books.
My colleagues who shook their heads over my lack of academic purity might remember that I have long been an early-adapter. I love what's new if it makes life easier. As a medievalist, I revere those old 12th-century volumes, hand-written by dedicated monks on the thinnest possible vellum. But I'd have been first in line when Gutenberg started cranking up his press. So I still am today.
|
|
|
Michele DeFilippo: Posted on Thursday, April 21, 2011 4:06 PM
Once upon a time, there lived a talented baker named
George. Long before dawn each morning, while most people slept, George arrived
at his employer’s successful bakery. The boss was demanding and grumpy, always
telling George what to bake and when to bake it.
“The customer is always
right,” the boss said.
 George would just shake his head and get back to the
work he loved, crafting the tastiest varieties of bread, rolls, cakes, cookies,
pies, and pot pies that the neighbors had come to expect. Each afternoon, when
he left for the day, he said to himself, Someday,
I’ll open my own bakery, and I’ll bake whatever I want. He saved his money
and waited patiently for that day to arrive.
At long last, the perfect building for George’s
bakery became available. It was located on a busy street, near a bus stop, a
school, a factory, and many homes. This
is wonderful, thought George. I’ll
have customers all day long, and maybe during the factory’s night shift, too.
For weeks before the grand opening, everyone in the
area eagerly anticipated the breads, rolls, cakes, cookies, pies, and pot pies
they’d be able to buy. The factory workers and tired commuters looked forward
to a savory, ready-to-eat dinner; the schoolchildren waited for a sweet
after-school snack; everyone looked forward to their favorite varieties of
breads and rolls.
 George was more nervous than he expected, so he played
it safe. On grand opening day, customers streamed into George’s bakery, but
curiously, the only item for sale was pumpernickel bread. Dozens and dozens of
loaves of pumpernickel bread. Nothing else.
Oh,
well, they thought, it’s only the
first day. Maybe tomorrow there will be more breads, rolls, cakes, cookies,
pies, and pot pies. Some customers bought a loaf of pumpernickel
bread, because they had waited so long for George’s bakery to open, but most
customers decided to return the next day.
The next day, and the next, and the next, they gave
George another chance, but again they found only pumpernickel bread. Each day,
one or two people bought a loaf. Finally, an exasperated customer asked George,
“This is a bakery! When will you offer white bread, rolls, cakes, cookies,
pies, and pot pies?”
“It’s expensive to bake those things,” he
replied. “I want to make sure my bakery is a success first.” “Oh,” said the disappointed customer.
Gradually, the flood of new customers slowed to a
trickle. After a few visits, the factory workers went back to brown-bagging it
and the schoolchildren realized they would find no cookies at George’s bakery. Everyone else reluctantly accepted that George would only offer pumpernickel
bread, no matter what they wanted.
Finally, the day came when not one customer showed up.
George was puzzled. Isn’t my pumpernickel
bread any good, he wondered? So he walked out front and stopped a gentleman
on the street. “Why don’t you come in to my bakery,” he asked?
“Because I don’t like pumpernickel bread,” the man
replied simply. “I buy quite a lot of white bread, cakes, and pies.”
“Oh,” said George. “But I can’t afford to bake those
things. At least not until I make some money from my pumpernickel bread.”
“Very well,” said the gentleman.
We know how this parable ends, don’t we? Poor George’s
bakery failed. He went back to work for his grumpy, demanding boss who
understood that it was necessary to give customers what they want.
New publishers who decide to test the market with only an eBook are making exactly the
same mistake that George made. They rightly offer their eBook on Amazon and
other online retailers where millions of customers can see it 24/7, but then
fail to offer the book in other formats that customers want to buy.
It’s undeniably attractive to publish only an eBook.
The costs are minimal and it’s scary for any new publisher to invest in cover
design and typesetting when they don’t know if their book will be a success.
But guess what? Plenty of people still prefer a printed book, no matter how
much eBook devotees bend and twist the statistics. No business owner can lock
out a significant portion of their potential market and hope to succeed.
Today, publishers are not just book providers, they
are content providers. Consumers want
to receive information in different ways at different times. Some people buy
printed books to read at home, a welcome change from looking at a computer
screen at the office all day. Others buy Ebooks to read at the airport. Others
listen to audio books while driving. Some consumers buy the same book in
multiple formats. It’s risky to provide content in only one form. Publishers
may sell some books in that format, but it’s impossible to count the number of
sales that were missed.
My advice? Offer that eBook, but also print POD at Lightning Source. Yes, there’s the
one-time charge for cover and interior design, but at least you will be
offering your book to everyone who
may want it. If and when the day arrives that you are selling only eBooks, you
can always stop printing.
As Dan Poynter, The Book Futurist, says:
“Some writers plan to publish digitally only—to save money. This is a mistake.
If you publish an eBook, you are perceived as a writer. If you publish a pBook
(paper), you are regarded as an author. Paper books are retained; PDFs
disappear in a click. Self-publishers should offer editions to fit any
lifestyle: Paper, eBook, LARGE PRINT for the visually impaired, audio book, etc.
Give the buying customer what he or she wants.”
Just like George’s very smart boss.
 Michele's company, 1106 Design (http://1106design.com) works with authors, publishers, business pros, coaches, consultants, speakers . . . anyone who wants a beautiful book, meticulously prepared to industry standards. Top-quality cover design, beautifully designed and typeset interiors, manuscript editing, indexing, title consulting, and expert advice. All available from one convenient source. All offered with our most important service, hand-holding. Prompt, personalized service. Satisfaction guaranteed. We’ll take better care of you and your book than any “self-publishing company.” How may we help you?
|
|
|
