The proofs of my next two print books have arrived from CreateSpace! And in record time, too — four days! I ordered them last Friday night. The next morning I got emails saying they had shipped. Really? The estimated arrival date was December 7th, so I was bowled over to see the parcel sitting on the table when I got home today. Impressive!
Now I have to read, or at least scan them for errors. In fact, I’ve already found a couple of instances of missing quotation marks. Aargh!
But not as much of an “aargh” as with the first book, where I omitted the physical proof copy step altogether, being in a big rush to have copies to give as Christmas presents. OK, the errors were minuscule, but irritating as no-see-um bites — a couple of typos and two part-title pages not bolded. More significantly, if I had been able to look at a physical copy I would have realized that my line spacing was too generous. It’s easier to read, perhaps, but the book ended up being a big, fat 554 pages and priced accordingly. Book 2 of the series has 6,000 more words, but is only 381 pages.
Quite a difference!
Make mistakes and learn from them.
In the meantime, I am delighted with the books. They look great. And it’s true — there’s something about hefting and paging through a physical, printed book that ebooks simply can deliver. It makes all the labour of formatting (and proofing) worthwhile.
Title page
The other title page
Audrey Driscoll's Blog 
They look gorgeous! Especially the spines. A gorgeous book cover is a wonderful thing, but nice spines are hard to come by. That sounds a bit weird, but I think you understand what I mean, lol.
So would you go back at some point in the future and reformat the first book? Obviously it would require getting your artist to redo the spine in the new size.
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Thanks for the compliment. I think the cover images are gorgeous as well. The designer decided not to try fitting the entire title on the spines, only the volume titles, which I think was the right thing to do. The Mercurius symbol at the top of the spines (my idea) is a nice touch too (she said, modestly). It’s a reference to alchemy, which figures in the series.
I don’t actually have plans right now to reissue the first book in a slimmed-down version. There’s still the fourth book to publish in print, for one thing. But I suppose it would make sense to do that at some point. The Friendship of Mortals, compact edition — I can see it happening, someday.
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Compact edition! Love it. People who haven’t bought the books will be so perplexed when they buy it and see it’s just a regular sized book that’s slightly slimmer than usual.
Also, I really like the Mercurius symbol. Good choice!
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