Designer Peter Holm, Sterling Hill Productions, has finished the first page proofs and pagination for my new book Wind Energy for the Rest of Us.
The good news is that with a smaller font size and tighter leading (the space between lines) than in my previous books, Holm has been able to substantially reduce the number of printed pages from that expected. My previous publisher, professional editors, and Holm himself had estimated that the nearly 300,000-word manuscript would require more than 700 printed pages. However, first page proofs, including back matter (short of the index) is now 549 pages.
First page proofs are another step in the long process that produces a printed book from an author’s manuscript. First page proofs—the layout of the book—determine where each element falls on a page and the number of pages in each chapter and, thus, the book.
Wind Energy for the Rest of Us is a complex book for a designer because it includes 428 illustrations and 118 tables. Both the complexity and the length of the manuscript make it difficult for the designer to estimate the length of the book.
Though they are called first page proofs, there have been several versions as the designer and I worked through formatting problems over the past few weeks.
The book is now in the proofreader’s hands, the next step in the process. The proofed pages return to me for a final edit. (I already have seven pages of corrections that need to be addressed.)
After proofreading, is indexing.
