Publishing books is a fascinating and somewhat mysterious process. Readers do not know the stages of the birth of their favorite book, and even many authors are unaware of the intricacies of the birth of their work! Most printers are reluctant to share details about the book publishing process, perhaps because they fear competition. However, we are ready to lift the veil of secrecy and help authors to orientate themselves in making a decision regarding the publication of their works.
In this article, you will learn about all the stages of book publishing.
Where do books start?
“With the cover,” many of you will think, and you would be wrong. Publishing any book begins with a search! With finding a publisher who will publish an author’s work. It’s not enough just to write a novel, novella or poem – sooner or later you’ll want to publish it, and then the authors start having problems…
For the novice author to find a publishing house, which at his own expense will undertake to publish his book is virtually unreal. Only authors who are already well-known can count on this. And to become famous – it is necessary to publish their books. It turns out a vicious circle.
Why do you need to publish books?
For material gain. Every author dreams that his book will become known and bring income. To realize this is difficult, but possible. To declare yourself as a writer, playwright or poet. It is very important for a creative person to be heard! To do this, it is necessary not only to write interesting works, but also to publish them.
To promote and advertise your business or occupation. Publishing books helps to attract more customers, and also increases the “expertise” of the author. A book will also be useful if you are doing research for grants. Use the publication to tell the story of your research.
Promote your ideas and find like-minded people. Publishing a book will be useful to be heard, to become familiar with your research, to provide support, and maybe even to sponsor some research or expeditions. 1 Publish a memory book. We can help you publish a history of your kind, publish a memoir or a book about the history of your company and its staff.
Buying the rights to a book
The rights to a book for translation into English are bought by a publishing house when it plans to publish foreign authors. Typically, publishers choose either well-known authors or popular works. Depending on the demand of the author and his work, the rate of rights purchase or royalties from sales will be from 6% to 10%, in rare cases it can be 15% of sales.
Translation of the book into English
Works of foreign authors require high-quality translation, because the success of the book depends on it. For fiction translation it is recommended to find a translator who has experience in such work, so that he likes and appreciates his translations.
However, if you need to translate specialized literature into English (medicine, engineering), you will need specialized translators. Most often, to simplify the process, the translation editor identifies a source of terminology (this can be another book or a translated and edited book chapter), which serves as a model for translators to work on a specialized book.
Preparing the book for publication
The level of a book’s output depends on how all the stages of its preparation for publication are followed. We do not recommend saving by rejecting certain items: the loss in quality will be much greater than the savings. If you want to get a really high-quality book as a result, it is advisable to adhere to all the steps outlined below.
Having your book proofread by an expert or translation editor
To be sure that the translation is correct, it is best to find an expert on the topic, who will read the book and give an opinion, recommend the correctness of the terms, and suggest corrections. For example, if you are translating a book about a sport such as soccer, it is a good idea to have it proofread by someone familiar with this sport, e.g. a coach, a sports commentator, an athlete.
If you cannot find an expert on the topic, then the translation editor takes care of the proofreading. He should first study the topic from various sources and then proofread the book.
Proofreading by a literary editor
This type of proofreading involves a large amount of labor-intensive work:
- the logic of the plot in the prose is corrected;
- The chronology of plot development is corrected;
- doubtful turns of phrase are eliminated or rewritten;
- incomprehensible “foggy” places in the text are corrected;
- correct grammatical and punctuation errors in the text.
Of course, not all works require a complete set of works on the proofreading of prose literature. However, over the years, our publishing house has come across different works: for example, we proofread a novel of 400 pages written in one paragraph.
We would like to note that all comments made by the literary editor are always agreed with the author, and only then they are added to the text or not.
Preparation of illustrations
Illustrations include photos, drawings, charts, tables, graphs. If illustrations are planned for a work of fiction or poetry, the author notes the pages (chapters) to which illustrations are needed and tells what story he sees. Based on the author’s descriptions, the artist makes a drawing which the author approves or does not approve.
If you plan to publish specialized books (educational, technical, research), then the author prepares the illustrations himself, and the publisher only corrects them, making them suitable for printing. If necessary, the publisher can involve a specialist who knows how to draw diagrams in certain programs, such as mathematical modeling or computer-aided design programs.
Layout layout: the nuances of choice
After all the points on the text and illustrations are agreed with the author, the publishing house proceeds to the layout of the book. Make-up is the process of arranging the text, illustrations and various graphic objects in the form in which they will be presented in the finished book.
A special program and an experienced professional are needed to make the layout. The publisher makes professional book layouts in a computer program. In this program headings and footers are made out, illustrations and graphics are inserted, footnotes are made, and the content is collected.
However, in order to reduce the cost of the publication process, some authors make the layout of the book in Word. This option is possible only if digital printing will be done. Word does not follow any printing standards, so there is always the risk of having to redo everything. Also, the author should understand that the quality of the book with such a layout will be somewhat lower, especially when printed in color.
Note that if the offset printing of the book is planned, then only professional layout program – Adobe Indesign is used.
Assigning indices and codes
The publishing house adheres to all the rules and norms of book design, so all the necessary codes, indexes (in particular, the UDC, the LBC, ISBN), copyright, bar codes are assigned necessarily.
Cover – the face of the book
The first impression of a book is formed by its cover. And you will not have a second chance to make a first impression. Therefore, it is very important, especially in fiction, to make the cover attractive, memorable. It is the author who decides what the cover of his book will be, and we, as a publisher, bring his wishes to life.
Covers can be very different:
- contain only the title and last name of the author;
- combined from various photos;
- drawn in watercolor, pencil, ink;
- have a gold/silver or relief embossing.
The options for decorating the cover are almost endless, it can be a small work of art, and can be in a minimalistic style, in any case, everything is limited only by the imagination of the author and the budget.
Note that if the author wants to make a cover with embossing – the production may take a little longer than usual. For embossing in a special program is painstakingly drawn future metal stamp, which will be making stamping foil on the cover.
Correction of the layout
We mentioned above that the author’s text is proofread very carefully, sometimes with the help of several specialists. However, at the final stage of publishing, the work is once again given to a proofreader. During the layout of the text in the layout may appear layout mistakes, inaccuracies in the transfer of words, wrong quotation marks, some punctuation defects – all this is corrected by the proofreader.
The subtleties of typography
It is possible to make a test print of a few copies, rather than an entire print run, in digital printing. However, authors should keep in mind that it will be more expensive than just running the entire run in print, because it will be necessary to make adjustments to the printing press.
It is possible to print part of the print run in different types of covers (hard and soft), but then it will be treated as two different print runs, because it will require two different cycles of printing and assembling the book. Accordingly, it will cost the author much more.
Circulation of the print run
We offer two types of distribution of printed copies:
- Supplies to stores and sales to wholesalers;
- Distribution via the Internet in electronic form.
It should be borne in mind that the distribution of paper copies will require additional costs of the publishing house, because the books should be stored, delivered to the stores, fill out various accounting and supporting documents, keep records, pay taxes and much more.