Geek's Guide to Publishing a Book Part 3...

...What is publishing?

Just a scant few years ago, having a book published meant writing a manuscript, submitting it to a publishing company, who, upon acceptance, would pay you a royalty for the privilege of printing and selling you tome. Upon acceptance, perhaps before, you would hire an agent, who would take over the onerous task of dealing with the publisher. The publisher, in turn,would take over all of the tasks that were associated with turning your manuscript into a real, physical book. You, on the other hand, worked on your next tome.

Today, this has all changed and it has changed because of cheap PCs, cheap laser printers, and the Internet. Unfortunately, many would-be authors seem to still be caught in the pre-Internet mind-set.

Before we continue, go and grab a hard cover book, preferably one with an intact dust jacket.

Now, take your book and examine it closely:

• Look at how the covers are made and attached to the body of the book.
• See how the pages are grouped together (these are called signatures) and how the groups are assembled together.
• Look at the dust jacket and its artwork. Does it have a barcode on the back?
• Open the book and examine the first few pages. Note how each is laid-out.
• Now look at an interior page of the book. Notice the font used, line spacing, and font size. Look at how the words are laid-out on the physical page.

A book is a physical manifestation of someone's story or idea. It can contain a person's dreams, knowledge, and/or experiences. For this discussion, though, the most important aspect is that a book must be designed, the information transferred, and the book assembled. In my humble opinion, publishing is literally the transformation of the abstract into the physical.

More on this later.

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