Design and Layout for Printed Books

ooks teach, enlighten, and transport us to times and worlds beyond our own. I love them and have been designing and laying out books for more than 30 years. I am experienced in book layout and have created books for the mining industry, the water treatment industry, the veterinary medical field, holistic books for health practitioners, and novels, fiction, and fairy tales for freelance authors.

I work in the PC environment and use InDesign. InDesign is well-suited for creating books of all kinds, although it lacks an equation builder for technical books and this requires that simple equations are hand-built within InDesign and complex equations are created in a separate program. I use Adobe Illustrator.

Once the book has been designed, layed out, and all corrections and changes made, I create pdf files to send to your printer. I create these final files to match each printer's requested PDF creation settings.

I have worked with excellent editors and project managers for years who specialize in technical and fiction books. A project manager can keep a book moving through all the pre-production and production stages. A good editor can bring order out of chaos and catch all those spelling and grammar errors that keep a book from becoming a good book. If you need a project manager or an editor, I can recommend some or you can find one through the Web. Have the book edited before it is layed out. Good freelance editors are usually very busy, so leave time in your schedule.

Illustrations and Images

I can create technical or fine art illustrations for your books. For more information, please see the Book Illustration page.

If you prefer to use images (photos) for your work, I can either use high-resolution images that you send me or purchase images from a photo service. I use Photoshop to make the images look their best and to size and crop them so they will fit your layout and enhance your book.

For samples of some of the books I've recently created, please see the Book Samples page.

Sheryl has prepared four of my books for publication, and I wouldn’t consider working with anyone else. She brings years of experience, knowledge of what’s possible, enthusiasm, and ideas that enhance the words with intelligent presentation. My printer says of her work, "She knows what she’s doing."

I’ve learned to respect the insight behind her suggestions and be grateful that she never tries to bully me into accepting them. Through this long collaboration, I’ve come to regard her as a trusted friend. Besides, she makes me laugh.

Donna Ashworth,
Small Mountain Books