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DYE HARD PRESS NEWSLETTER #7

FORWARD

A book cover, like a poster, is an attention grabber – a visual and verbal message designed to make us react by wanting and buying what is offered. The book cover is essentially the packaging of a product – what we see on the outside indicates what we should find inside.

BOOK-COVER PSYCHOLOGY

On display, the front cover of a book is usually the first thing we see. It presents the title, the author’s name and sometimes a subtitle (‘A collection of short stories’) or a strapline (‘New gripping number-one bestseller’). Almost immediately we look at the back cover if it’s a soft-cover book or with a hard-cover book to the inside flaps of the dust jacket.

The back cover gives us the blurb – a brief encapsulation of the content of the book – often no longer than a paragraph in length. Good blurbs are selling blurbs: they raise questions to which we will find answers in the book. This is what makes us want to read the book and buy it. A review or two adds credibility.

ANATOMY OF A BOOK COVER

Softback

Front cover
Spine
Back cover
Endpapers (not essential)

Softback with flaps

Front cover plus flap
Spine
Back cover plus flap
Endpapers (not essential)

Hardback

Caselining
Caselining spine
Endpapers
Dust jacket standard with spine and flaps

ESSENTIAL COMPONENTS OF A BOOK COVER

Front cover essentials

Title
Author
Strapline (if necessary)
Edition (not necessary for 1st edition)
Publishers’ logo – not essential

Spine essentials

Title
Author
Publishers’ logo

Back Cover essentials

Blurb
Review extracts
Author/s brief biography/ies with/out photographs – not obligatory
Publishers’ logo
Publishers’ website address
Barcode with ISBN number
Recommended Retail Price (RRP) SA and international prices if applicable

Flaps – soft cover or dust jacket – essentials

Front cover flap – book blurb (can be more detailed)
Price – not obligatory

Back cover flap – author/s brief biography/ies with/out photographs
Publishers’ logo – not obligatory
Publishers’ website address

THE DESIGN PROCESS

Questions to consider when designing a book cover

Background
1. What is the book title?
2. Does it need a subtitle? (for example, “A Collection of Braai Verse”)
3. Is it one book in a series – does it need a series or genre brand? (“South African Alternative Poetry” or “Language - Poetry”)
4. What is the book about?
5. Who has written/edited it? (author’s/editor’s name/s)
6. Is author/editor previously published? (author/editor biographies)
7. Who will read this book? (target market/readership)
8. Why should they read this book? (what value will it give the reader?)
9. How will it be marketed? (introductory offer, piggy-back, advertising, e-marketing, instore display, or radio/TV )
10. How will it be distributed? (subscription, mail order, Internet, retail)

Technical
1. What is the size of the book? (custom, standard or A5, A4)
2. What is the format of the book? (landscape, portrait – always quote height first)
3. How many pages of text and what is the stock (or type) of paper? (necessary to calculate spine thickness)
4. What is the weight of the cover board stock? (necessary to calculate spine thickness)
5. Is the cover to be varnished, laminated, foiled or embossed?
6. How is the book bound? (stapled or perfect bound?)
7. Is printing conventional litho, digital or laser?
8. Is cover to be full colour or spot colour and how many?
9. Can colour/image ‘bleed off’ trim?
10. What marketing support material is required? (such as sell sheets, mailshot offers, or posters)

Most writers want to be involved with the design of the covers of their books. You, the publisher, however, are responsible for briefing the design and final approval of the cover. You carry the risk and the cost of producing and marketing the book and want it to sell. The choice of cover is yours, not the writer’s.

Commission a designer or prepare at least three visual alternatives of your book cover to print size, which you can trim and wrap around book dummies (see below). You can then test your covers on friends, local bookstores (ask the manager if you can see what your book looks like on their shelves – they know what sells), book clubs, libraries, schools (if youth subject matter).

Design considerations for book covers

Front Cover

Which comes first: the title or the author? There’s no set rule, but generally the title comes first, then author. Many publishers of contemporary novels by established writers use the author’s name as a brand followed by the title, for example, ‘John Grisham – his new bestseller – The Testament’.

You can dictate the order of author/title and its weighting, establishing which should be more prominent. The combination of title and author – the titlepiece – can and should be used on the title and half-title pages in the preliminary pages of the book. This creates a consistency of identity from cover to text. Your titlepiece effectively becomes the book’s logo.

Cover Typography: Look at book covers. Look at the typography. Typography is the juxtaposition of text with images. How many typefaces are used? Does it work? If not, why not? Use a clear, legible typeface for your title whether it’s a serif or a sans serif typeface. Limit the number of typefaces you use, for example, one for the title, and a complementary one for author’s name. Avoid clutter.

Cover Images: Do not use clip art or copyright free graphics on your cover: they serve only to cheapen your efforts, and worse, your author’s. When using photographs or illustration artwork, shortlist a selection of potential images and use only the best image/s for a cover.

Now, can the image/s you’ve selected be used better – perhaps deep etched, given a different background, altered, flipped, given a different treatment, for example, negative, soft focus, solarised etc? Technology allows us to manipulate images at will.

How do your selected image/s work in conjunction with your titlepiece? Does it have an impact? Would you buy it? If it doesn’t work, don’t use it.

Remember, the only time your cover is likely to be seen in isolation is when a reader is holding it. What will it look like on a shelf of a dozen other books?

Create a horizontal version of your titlepiece using the same typefaces for the spine and don’t forget your logo!

Book Cover Spines

The spine is generally the most visible element of a book since this is how we usually see a book on bookshelves.

Staple bound publications don’t require spines but there’s nothing stopping you from creating a ‘false spine’ down the left-hand and/or right-hand edge of the front or back covers respectively – particularly if it’s a series.

Perfect bound – square back – publications have a spine which should be used to identify the title, author and publisher. There are two considerations when calculating the spine thickness:
1. The actual thickness of the bound text stock
2. Plus the thickness of the cover stock

Hard cover publications require three considerations to calculate spine thickness:
1. The actual thickness of the bound text stock excluding the hard-cover casing
2. Plus the hard-cover casing thickness excluding the dust jacket (you will need this if you’re printing or foiling the spine with title / author / publisher logo)
3. The hard-cover casing including the text plus the dust jacket

How to calculate the thickness of the spine:

You will need a caliper (a tool used to measure thin materials such as paper) to measure the thickness of the paper stock, or a printer’s material caliper chart, which is much easier.

Printers and publishers generally use the following formula:

(number of pages ÷ 2) = number of sheets x paper grammage calipher in mm = spine thickness mm

Soft- cover book example

160 pages of 60gsm bond text with a caliper of 0.084 mm and covers of 250gsm Gloss Art board (unlaminated) with a caliper of 0.241 mm
(160 ÷ 2) x 0.084 = 6.720 mm
plus 2 x 0,241 = 7.202 mm

I would format the spine at 7.5 mm allowing for the bulge of the fold to front and back covers, but keep spine titlepiece height and width of publishers’ logo within a 5.5 mm dimension and centre these two elements on the width of 7.5mm

You can make your own dummy using the actual paper stocks you will print on and measure the bulk with a ruler. Alternatively, if you’re using a commercial printer, ask them to make a dummy using the stocks specified in their quotation.

I prefer the dummy route because it is the most accurate way visually and three dimensionally to determine the spine thickness for a soft cover book, dust jacket, hardcover book or slipcase. Printers generally do not charge for these dummies – particularly if they want the work!

The bonus is that I can use these printer’s book dummies to test covers and I end up with book dummies of various sizes for use on other projects.

Front- and back-cover flaps - softcover or dust jackets

Soft cover

Some soft-cover books have flaps almost the same width as the outside front cover. This strengthens the cover and adds bulk. It also provides space for a more detailed blurb and author’s biography as well as a marketing opportunity for other books you may have published or plan to publish.

Dust jackets
The width of dust jacket flaps varies depending on the size and format of the book. Generally allow for a flap of at least 80mm width. Remember to allow for the thickness of the hard-cover caselining.

You can extend the cover design on to the flaps from front and back, but be mindful that your blurb and or author biography be legible if overprinting imagery. Be wary of white type – whatever its size – in images or solid panels of colour, especially if there’s a lot of text.

Back Cover

There is no reason why you shouldn’t repeat the titlepiece on the back cover though at a smaller size, since this reinforces awareness of the title. Similarly, your front cover imagery can be extended, repeated, flipped, or adapted on the back cover.

The blurb is all-important: present it in a typeface that is legible – that you can read easily – and readable – that invites you to read. Remember the leading (line spacing) between lines of type is just as important as type size.

Reviews can be given a different typographic treatment to draw attention, for example, in different typefaces or panels – but a word of caution: avoid clutter. Simplicity rules.

Barcodes require reproduction at prescribed sizes and will not ‘read’ if placed on dark backgrounds, in which case create a white panel to ‘behind’ the barcode.

Exercise discretion when sizing your logo. The book is your product and that’s what you’re selling. Don’t forget to include your website address or at least an e-mail address: I might not want to buy the book but I might want to see what else you publish.

BOOK COVER FINISHES

You can print a varnish – ¬ matt or gloss – to protect a cover from finger grease marks or even to isolated areas of images on your cover, including type.

Similarly you can combine varnishing with foiling – using metallic foils to highlight type or image. Embossing also adds another dimension to a cover by raising selected areas of type or image. Lamination of a cover – with either matt or gloss – is the best protection for a book that is going to have regular use.

You can combine all of these processes depending on the cover design and the capability of your printer. These finishes, however, do cost more.

Robin Stuart-Clark © April 2005