Preparing Your Family History Book for Publication

Preparing Your Family History Book for Publication After years of carefully researching and assembling a family history, many genealogists find that they want to make their work available to others. Family history means a lot more when its shared. Whether you want to print a few copies for family members or sell your book to the public-at-large, todays technology makes self-publishing a fairly easy process. How Much Will It Cost? To estimate publishing costs, you will need to consult with local quick-copy centers or book printers. Obtain bids for the publishing job from at least three companies since prices vary greatly. Before you can ask a printer to bid on your project, however, you need to know three vital facts about your manuscript: Exactly how many pages are in your manuscript. You should take the finished manuscript with you, including mock-ups of picture pages, introductory pages, and appendixes.Approximately how many books you want to be printed. If you want to print under 200 copies, expect most book publishers to turn you down and send you to a quick-copy center. Most commercial printers prefer a run of at least 500 books. There are a few short-run and print-on-demand publishers who specialize in family histories, however, who are able to print in quantities as small as a single book.What kind of book features you want. Think about the paper type/quality, print size and style, number of photos, and binding. All of these will factor into the cost of printing your book. Spend some time browsing through family histories at the library to get some ideas on what you want before heading to the printers. Design Considerations LayoutThe layout should be appealing to the readers eye. For example, small print across the entire width of a page is too hard for the normal eye to read comfortably. Use a larger typeface and normal margin widths, or prepare your final text in two columns. You can align your text on both sides (justify) or only on the left side as in this book. The title page and table of contents are always on the right-hand page - never on the left. In most professional books, chapters also start on the right page. Printing Tip: Use high-quality 60 lb. acid-paper paper for copying or printing your family history book. Standard paper will discolor and become brittle within fifty years, and 20 lb. paper is too thin to print on both sides of the page. No matter how you space the text on the page, if you plan to do double-sided copying, be sure that the binding edge on each page is 1/4 inch wider than the outside edge. That means the left margin of the front of the page will be indented 1/4 extra, and the text on its flip side will have that extra indentation from the right margin. That way, when you hold the page up to the light, the blocks of text on both sides of the page match up with one another. PhotographsBe generous with photographs. People usually look at photographs in books before they read a word. Black-and-white pictures copy better than color ones and are a lot cheaper to copy as well. Photographs can be scattered throughout the text, or put in a picture section in the middle or back of the book. If scattered, however, photos should be used to illustrate the narration, not detract from it. Too many photos scattered haphazardly through the text can distract your readers, causing them to lose interest in the narration. If youre creating a digital version of your manuscript, be sure to scan the pictures at least at 300 dpi. Balance your selection of pictures to give equitable coverage to each family. Also, be sure you include short but adequate captions that identify each picture - people, place, and approximate date. If you don’t have the software, skills, or interest in doing it yourself, printers can scan your photos into digital format, and enlarge, reduce, and crop them to fit your layout. If you have a lot of pictures, this will add quite a bit to the cost of your book. Binding Options Printing or Publishing the Book Some publishers will print hard-bound family histories with no minimum order, but this usually increases the price per book. The advantage to this option is that family members can order their own copies when they wish, and you arent faced with purchasing books and storing them yourself.