multiple fonts, recommendations

[Susan]

My characters spend part of their time discussing things in an online chat room. What is the best way to show this? I was thinking about using a seraph type for the book and a sans seraph type for the online stuff. Does that work in CreateSpace? for an eBook? Does anyone have any suggestions on what seraph or sans seraph font to use?

[C.B., Beach Body Moderator]

Createspace lets you make your book however you want. It is great like that. Whatever fonts you use are the fonts that show up.
I even have text messages in little boxes that mimic how they look on the phone. It can work very well as a visual cue.

Ebook files however only allow certain fonts, like 8 or so. Not sure where those are listed, but they are very limited. People can change the fonts as well, so I don't know if yours are even guaranteed to stay. You are probably better off having online chat in italics or something for this format.

Unless you are crazy, like I am, and turn your book into a print replica.

[C.B., Beach Body Moderator]

Here, I found my example:



For this to work in Createspace and in a printed format was a piece of cake compared to an ebook file.
As an ebook only certain devices can even open it, as it is a print replica and not an .epub.

For me, it was worth it. But for you? Not sure. But making it happen in print is not a chore compared to the ebook, so maybe you could try both?

[P.D.]

You could even use a square, DOS-type font in your print edition. Like Nova Square or one of the others on this page: http://www.identifont.com/similar?3GSD

In the ebook edition, I would use an indented block, probably with an extra line above/below the block as well.

_ Jack: like this, you know.
_ Jill: oh, like that.
_ Jack: yeah. lol.

Hmm. Goodreads strips spaces/tabs. I'll indent with an underscore.

[Martin]

In-line images of the chats may also work.

[R.]

I did something like this with inline news articles in RftS. All I did was to pull the margins in a bit to indicate that something was different.

[T. K. Elliott (Tiffany)]

Remember that if you use in-line images, this will be a problem for anyone who requires large print, as they will not be able to enlarge the image. Plus, you will increase the size of the book file.

I would go with P.D.'s suggestion - use indents. Possible indented italics.

The more you try to force your image of how the book out to appear onto your readers, the more complicated it's going to get (and the more chance something will break and/or you will annoy people). Remember, if it's well-written, your readers won't even see the font: they'll see your characters sitting at their respective computers.

[Susan]

You guys rule!

So, I can use the two-font idea in CreateSpace, and use an indent/underscore in Kindle.

So easy -- and I never would have thought of any of it.

Thank you so much! Please pat yourselves on the back!