Before we can begin designing your book, your manuscript needs to be edited, proofread, and finalized for production. A copyeditor will finish shaping your story on a broader level, and a proofreader will catch any typos and punctuation errors that might be lingering in your manuscript. Any edits that are required after this step will be worked into the Production process below during the “Author Review” stage.

• Timing: 2–4 weeks
• Required: Close-to-final manuscript
• Resources and Notes: Author will work one-on-one with editor to finalize the manuscript.

BOOK COVER DESIGN

Once we have your edited manuscript, key information about your book, and an understanding of your vision and ideas, we will begin the cover design process.

To start, you fill out our Design Form to share your vision and to ensure we are on the same page. We’ll then have a kick-off meeting to discuss. Cover concepts will be sent to you via email as a PDF, and we ask to receive your feedback within 5 business days.

We’ll then collaborate together, gathering your feedback and making adjustments, until the front cover is perfected. At this point, we can generate a high-res graphic you will be able to use for any of your book’s marketing efforts. The spine and the back cover will be completed during the Final Steps below.

• Timing: 2 weeks
• Required: Close-to-final manuscript; completed Design Form

PAGE DESIGN: CREATIVE DIRECTION

This is when we design the overall look of your book’s interior.

Delivery of Final Manuscript

Before we can begin the interior page design process, we’ll need your fully edited final manuscript. At this point, you’ll want to finalize the text as much as possible. We strongly encourage hiring a copyeditor to tighten things up on a broader level, and a proofreader to catch typos and punctuation errors that may have slipped through the cracks. Any changes after this step will need to be worked into the production process.

Page Design

After you send us your final edited manuscript, we provide you with sample interior pages to review with 2 unique design directions of your book layout for you to review. Then it’s your turn to provide honest feedback. From there, we make adjustments to create a design template that we’ll use to typeset your book. Up to 3 rounds of revisions are included.

• Timing: 2 weeks
• Required: Final manuscript; completed Design Form
• Notes: Page design cannot begin until the manuscript is professionally edited and final. We’ll send the page design as a PDF. To review, print the pages to see fonts at their intended size.

At this stage we’ll transform your manuscript page-by-page into what will ultimately be your finished book pages using the approved page design template we created for you. Once complete, we’ll send you a proof in PDF format for you to review and proofread.

• Timing: 2–6 weeks, depending on length and complexity
• Required: Approved page design
• Notes: No last-minute editorial changes will be accepted while we are typesetting your book. Any edits or typos you find should be included when you review the first typeset proof of your book (next step below). The first proof of your book will be delivered as a PDF.

It’s now time for you to read through your book one more time, which is now formatted as it will look in your printed book. This is a good phase to give your PDF to proofreaders to catch those inevitable typos.

• Timing: 1–2 weeks
• Required: First typeset proof of your book and author edits
• Notes: This is an important step that requires the author or proofreader to review the full book. We also require you to use Adobe’s Free Acrobat Reader to mark up your edits. Here is a helpful video on how to use the Adobe markup tools. Once completed, email us your PDF with the required edits, and we’ll implement them into your book layout.

We include up to 2 rounds of revisions. We ask that authors send second- and third-round edits within a week of receiving updated page proofs for review.

We take the compiled edits you have marked up and make any necessary changes to the proof. Once we’ve completed the revisions, you will be provided a second proof for review and approval. This is the time to make any final changes before we go to print.

• Timing: 1–2 weeks
• Required: First typeset proof of your book and author edits
• Notes: We include up to 2 rounds of revisions. We ask that authors send second- and third-round edits within a week of receiving updated page proofs for review.

BOOK REGISTRATION

Prior to publishing your book, we can help register it with Bowker and Library of Congress under your name and imprint. We can obtain ISBNs for each format of your book.

• Timing: 1 week
• Required: Completed Registration Form from author

Now is the time to send us your copy for the back cover, including any endorsements or images you might want to include, as well as an author biography to build the full cover, which includes the back cover and spine for softcover books, as well as dust jacket if applicable. We will collaborate on any edits and changes needed to get a final cover file for your printer. If you have enlisted our help for additional publishing assistance, this is the point in the process where we will register your book for an ISBN and Library of Congress number, as well as create a barcode and publisher logo for your publishing imprint.

• Timing: 1 week
• Required: Back Cover Copy Form  (book summary, endorsements, author biography, etc) author’s photo, publisher’s logo, ISBN, retail price
• Notes: Proofread. Proofread. Proofread.

This is your final review. Once we get your final approval that everything looks great, you will be billed for your remaining balance and we’ll send you your print ready files. Then, it’s time for you to upload your final files to your printer or online distributor like Amazon’s KDP or IngramSpark. (They will likely require one last approval before your book is printed), print and share your book!

• Timing: 1 week
• Required: Author approval of final print book files

• Notes: Final deliverables will be separate, print-ready PDF files of your book’s interior and cover, plus the EPUB file and high-resolution .jpeg file of your front cover for the eBook. eBook conversion will start after print book is final.

ebook Conversion  

Using your finalized print book, we can convert your book to digital format. We will retain as much of the formatting from the print version as possible, and provide an online proof for review and approval. A final, ePub file will be provided to you so you can upload to the book retailers of your choice.

• Timing: 1–2 weeks
• Required: Author approval of final print book files
• Notes: We will provide a link to retrieve your final ePub file. We suggest you upload it to your KDP account and view the ebook using their online preview tool. This will give you the opportunity to preview how it will look page-by-page from there as if you were reading it on a Kindle device. This is not a time to make any edits to your manuscript. This universal ePub file can be used to upload to any online ebook retailer you choose to sell your ebook.

PRINT ON DEMAND SETUP: Uploading Files to Printer

We can also help get your book set up on Amazon’s KDP, IngramSpark, and other platforms for print-on-demand sales.

• Timing: 1–2 days
• Required: Author approval to send final files to print