Weekly Writers: Formatting; Front Matter Versus Back Matter

Presentation is important

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Formatting

Let us assume you have a completed book. It is quality work, well-written, engaging, and should resonate with readers. That gives it the best starting point for success. Now we can move on to the stages that turn the polished ideas into a finished item.

In future posts I’ll provide more information about the tasks involved in formatting the text for a printed or electronic book. Even if you’re having a book published by a traditional publisher, it is useful to understand the conventions, processes and options. For my own part, I am fascinated by this kind of thing.

When I use the term formatting, I mean it to encompass typesetting, which is the more traditional name for preparing a manuscript for printing. Nowadays all books start with digitally formatted documents.

Getting formatting right means a book is pleasant to read and doesn’t distract you from the text. Get it wrong and it would look amateurish and difficult to read. We want the reader’s first impression to be one of confidence: “You’re safe in my hands, I know what I’m doing” and that comes from both content and presentation. You can’t go wrong if you follow standard conventions of layout for chapters, images, tables, headings, paragraphs, and running heads, but you will go wrong if you don’t. It’s hugely important, and yet is one of those things where – when done well – the work that has gone into it isn’t noticeable, because everything is in the correct place.