Should I use offset or digital or handmade?
• Who will design the cover?
• How many colours will appear on the cover?
• Who will design the pages?
• Will there be any use of colour, illustrations or photographs inside the book?
• Who will lay out the pages?
• Who will print the book?
• How many copies should be printed?
• What paper stock should be used to print it?
GETTING HELP
The book publishing industry is a maze of associations, some of which can be very useful to the home publisher. The Editors’ Association of Canada’s website has an especially helpful section on publishing associations at www.editors.ca/web/assoc.htm. (Inevitably, some of the association web addresses below will go out of date quite quickly.The EAC site will provide you with up-to-date links, and also has links to non-Canadian resources.)
Some home publishers find they really need professional help with book design, editing or some other aspect of the publishing process. It is often worth the expense of bringing on a pro to help with the aspects that are giving you the most trouble. And, of course, if your budget is big enough you can have professionals do a lot of the work for you.
Some associations that offer useful services to Canadian home publishers are:
• Alcuin Society (www.alcuinsociety.com) is a Canadian organization for people with a broad range of interests concerning books and publishing, including the book arts of printing, binding, papermaking, calligraphy and illustration.
• The Canadian Association of Photographers and Illustrators in Communications (CAPIC) maintains a database of CAPIC members by style and specialty. It is used to responding to enquiries from potential clients about book and magazine photographers and illustrators. (www.capic.org)
• The Canadian Authors Association, which has branches nation-wide, offers meetings, workshops and an annual conference to published and unpublished writers. CAA is an excellent resource if you need help polishing your writing. (www.canauthors.org)
• The Canadian Publishers’ Council (CPC) represents the interests of 30 companies that publish books and other media for elementary and secondary schools, colleges and universities, and professional reference, retail and library markets. (Grossly simplified, the CPC represents the big publishers and the ACP represents the others.) (www.pubcouncil.ca)
• The Editors’ Association of Canada (www.editors.ca), with branches across the country, offers regional referral “hotlines” for people needing editorial help.
• The Graphic Designers of Canada’s website (www.gdc.net) has links to the sites of many of the association’s members to help you find professional design help.
• The Indexing and Abstracting Society of Canada (www.indexingsociety.ca) has a referral service for anyone needing a book index prepared.
The next chapter guides you through the two preliminary steps in most publishing projects: preparing a budget and a schedule.
There are two essential elements to virtually every publishing project: a budget and a schedule.This chapter leads you through the process of preparing both of these.
THE BUDGET
Publishing projects have a way of costing more that you dreamed possible. This chapter will help you anticipate and control your costs. Of course, if you are producing a photocopied, hand-bound book entirely by yourself, cost is not going to be a major consideration and you can skip this section. If you are independently wealthy, you can probably get by without a budget, too. (Of course, you didn’t get to be independently wealthy by ignoring budget considerations!)
THE SCHEDULE
Do you need to produce your books by a certain date? If so, you need to prepare a schedule. Even if you have no “due date,” you should have some idea of how long each step should take.
This chapter ends with a sample budget and schedule. But before we get to them, it is useful to consider the steps in the process individually, to look at how long they typically take and how they affect costs.The following estimate table shows what it would cost if you paid a professional to do each step and how long each step should take.
BUDGET AND SCHEDULE ESTIMATE
A SAMPLE BUDGET
The following budget tries to break even on selling 250 books. How realistic that sales target is really depends on the individual project. It is far better to set the projected sales as low as possible and get a pleasant surprise than to be too optimistic and lose a fortune.
FAMILY AND MONEY
We have already discussed how this project is indeed a labour of love.Although it may be true, it is also code for “don’t expect to make a profit, unless you are related to King Tut.”Your financial goal, if any, is to break even or at least to cover some of the costs of producing and shipping the book. The project’s great reward will be finally seeing your family history documented and enjoyed by others for generations to come.
However gratifying this might be, you must consider how to pay for the book’s production so you do not go into debt. Although money is the most contentious topic of discussion within families (apart from the topic of the cousin who ran away with the circus), you must deal with the financial realities. Three main courses of action are open to you.
Pay All Expenses Yourself
You can chose to produce a fairly inexpensive book with a small print run. Perhaps you feel that since you took on the project, you should shoulder the costs. Or, you are wealthy, generous and have no reservations about giving away hundreds of copies. If you can comfortably afford to take on all expenses involved in the book, you have no reason to worry about a potentially awkward conversation, or about what to give everyone for their birthdays next year.
Solicit Donations from Relatives
You are committed and passionate about the project, but you can’t possibly pay for everything alone. How do you bring up the subject of a bit of financial help?
Some relatives, usually the ones
