Why you should always, always order a proof…

I’m just a few days away from my first print run for The Natural Order.  For everyone in the US who orders a copy, it will be print-on-demand, meaning each order is printed individually and I don’t have to stock any copies.

Here in New Zealand, though, I’m planning to hold the book launch party in early June, followed quickly by a book tour during which we attempt to get the book into as many independent bookstores as possible.  I have a feeling it will be less of a challenge to get bookstore placement than in the US, because the smaller population means fewer authors and therefore a higher interest in authors who actually live in New Zealand.

Anyway, yesterday my first two proof copies arrived in the mail, just in time.  I had almost given up on waiting for them and ordered several hundred copies before checking to make sure they were right.

Well, that would have been a BIG MISTAKE!!

When Createspace tells you the photo you’ve chosen is too small a file to make a high-quality cover, they mean it.  Even though the photo was such a high resolution that it still looks crystal-clear blown up to twice the size of the actual cover, the printed cover was horribly pixelated, and what’s more, the perfectly centered title was skewed to the right.

I spent hours last night fixing the new cover to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

I almost resorted to taking a photo of the cover and blowing that up, though it would certainly have resulted in a loss of detail.  Instead I discovered that you can just change the dimensions of the photo so it’s large enough to fit Createspace’s requirements.

You know what really confused me, though?  Createspace says the photo file must be a minimum of 300 dpi (dots per inch)…and my original file was exactly 300 dpi!  I ended up tripling the original file size before Createspace recognized it as large enough.

You can see why I’m not a huge fan of technology!

This whole book project has exponentially increased my understanding of computers, though.  Before I didn’t know anything about websites beyond the fact that you can make one using a basic template on WordPress, and now I know all about domain hosting and SEO.

Anyway, that’s certainly a lesson for the future–never, ever order a large number of copies of anything without first making certain that the proof is perfect.