Book Design Made Simple will help you succeed with your book.
Book Design Made Simple is the only comprehensive resource for designing and typesetting your own book using Adobe InDesign. It’ll teach you everything you need to know, from deciding on a size for your book to finding the best look for it, creating a page design and a cover, typesetting it, and sending the properly formatted files to the printer.
You can do it! We’ve laid out each part of the process in logical steps for the new designer and typesetter. Some topics take a dozen pages to explain, and some take only one or two. There’s no need to read the entire book—simply use the sections that’ll help you design your book and skip the rest (see the Contents here).
Getting started
You can lease Adobe InDesign for as few or as many months as you need it (it’s part of Adobe’s Creative Cloud package). In Part I of the book, you’ll learn how to lease and install Adobe InDesign, create a document, and import your manuscript from Word. Download Part I for free by subscribing to our blog—simply use the form to the right or below.
InDesign comes with several typefaces suitable for book design, and in Book Design Made Simple we walk you through the process of setting up your pages and book cover using typefaces that are already available to you in InDesign. Also included in Creative Cloud is Acrobat, software you’ll use to generate your final PDFs to send to the printer. Don’t worry, we’ll help you every step of the way.
What readers say
Book Design Made Simple has been used by authors, designers, and editors. Every level of InDesign user, from complete beginner to advanced designer, finds our explanations clear and easy to follow. Here’s what our readers say:
“What indie authors have wanted—and what they keep asking me for—is step-by-step instruction in creating industry standard books with today’s tools and for today’s book production requirements. That’s what Book Design Made Simple delivers, and it does so beautifully.”
—Joel Friedlander, TheBookDesigner.com
“Book Design Made Simple is the ultimate resource on creating a book using InDesign.”
—Lyle Litzenberger, author of Burke & Widgeon: A Hiking Guide
“Book Design Made Simple promises to become the bible on book design.”
—Ernst Vegt, Coast Imaging Arts, prepress and color management professional
“It will make beginners look professional and professionals look even better.”
—Rafael Perez, book cover designer, Colonus Publishing
DIY book design—you can do it!
Save time and money—do it yourself with help from the experts. This book shows you HOW and explains WHY. So take control of your creative vision and make it happen!
Book Design Made Simple is an award-winning book. It’s available now at your local bookstore or purchase a copy here.
The Book Design Made Simple website, book, videos, and blog will help you with every aspect of how to design a book, whether you’re already an experienced book designer or a complete novice. You’ll find lots of info about book design, InDesign, and publishing here.
Join our book design community by subscribing to our blog (see the form below) and downloading chapters 1 to 9 (Part I) of the book for free. See if Book Design Made Simple is right for you! You’ll also receive updates about any important changes to InDesign and notice of our monthly blog posts and new video tutorials.