Self-Published Books Need a Professional Appearance To Court Success by Kae Cheatham
Not long ago, I read a
self-published book produced by a printing company, where the author
was required to furnish not only the manuscript, but the layout and
cover. The cover was the best part of this book. The story had
potential (although erratic and overwritten) and was compelling enough
that, out of curiosity, I finished it. I have read esthetically-rough
fiction from traditional publishers, but those at least had a
professional layout and had been scrutinized by a copy editor. This
one--not.
I have no gripe with the concept of self-publishing, but if a writer
wants a book to be taken seriously, some basics have to be considered.
Liberal use of Strunk and White (Elements of Style) is a must, as well
as referring to Chicago Manual of Style. Be certain punctuation is
correctly rendered. Three periods (...) does not an ellipse make.
Ellipses are not followed by any other punctuation ["What do you
mean…, you have to go?"]. Uppercase letters should rarely be
used for emphatic dialogue ["what WE did, did NOT cause what
happened"]; description before dialogue should not end with a comma.
[Green eyes betrayed her, "I'm sure you do."].
A copy editor would have caught ninety-eight percent of these errors,
as well as the character names that changed mid-scene.
Regarding layout, the text alignment in a professional book is
justified, with widow and orphan control, usually with 11pt type and
type kerning so lines of text have uniformity. Quotation marks and
apostrophes must be consistent throughout the text, not curly marks to
start dialogue with straight apostrophes in contractions. A disregard
(or ignorance) of these basics is what I see most in self-published
books.
Self-publishing has a lot of benefits, especially to the environment.
With traditional publishers, if they have a print run of 3,000 books,
2,000 of them can set in a warehouse for six months and then end up in
a landfill. Most self-published material is print-on-demand, so less
paper and printer ink is used. But if an author wants to do more than
give away his self-published book to friends and family, the book must
have a professional appearance, regardless of the story.
When someone has plans to publish more than one book, having a good
product is especially critical. Marketing and hype might sell a decent
number of a poorly-produced book, but once the dearth of editing and
layout are realized, the reader might not want to chance another book
from the same source. More than 5,000 books are produced each week by
self publishing. That makes competition stiffer than ever for a
reader’s attention. To produce a book correctly is more time
consuming, but highly cost effective and can give the edge needed to
make a book stand out. Using a professional copy editor and investing
in a good text layout program, will result in a finished product on par
with traditional publishers.
About the Author
K Follis Cheatham is a freelance editor, and author of nine books of fiction and nonfiction; she has published numerous articles and poems, and edited for national magazines and publishing houses. Cheatham gives presentations at schools and libraries on writing and the American West; she also develops promotional materials (including web sites) for authors. Visit her web site at http://www.kaios.com.