Your Name In Print

The print edition of Encounter At Carlin Cove: and Other Stories turned up at home yesterday, and I spent the evening reading through it ostensibly to check for formatting errors; in reality of course I was basking in the enjoyment of seeing something I’d written in print.

The first thing that struck me was how nice the cover looked in print. The wraparound design is a simple one but effective. Originally I had put together a much more garish cover which a few people commented on, one or two negatively, which made me rethink it pretty early. So then I set about doing an alternative design which perhaps reflects the contents of the book differently and a little more “accessibly”. This is the design you’ll see now if you go and find my book over on Amazon.

This design looks a lot nicer in print than my original would, and looks far more like a “real book”. Inside the formatting again is simple but effective, lacking any bells-and-whistles but doing the job.

I can see how the next book can be improved on in its presentation, I can see how a few small images here and there, a little more elaborate formatting, could improve the visual experience; and this – of course – would also extend to the e-book version (as I would want them to mirror each other as closely as possible).

I read through a few of the stories inside and I was surprised by them. Reading back your own work is usually a strange experience, it always seems like something someone else as written, but this is compounded when you read your own words in print.

Its a strangely alien experience and the strangest part of it for me was that I actually want people to read it now not because I wrote it, but because I actually like it. I want people to read it the same way as I want people to read any other book I’d read and enjoyed; I want people to read it because I think they might actually enjoy it.

posted by Alan Preece
on October, 11