Publication 04: Designing the Book Cover
In this blog post we cover the design of the book cover, the front, the back and the spine of the cover.
Possibly the most daunting aspect of designing and laying out the book cover, is that the task is very software driven. That can make book cover designing difficult if you are not adept at using the software. Later on in my blog posts covering publishing, I’ll discuss software, what they can do and which software packages I use.
Except for determining the physical dimensions of the book and being certain to leave sufficient room for the spine, there are no real rules that must be followed.
When setting the dimensions of the book, just realize that there is an optimum size for both the physical dimensions or the thickness for a book. Having said that, you do not want your book to be too thick or too thin. A good size range for the physical dimensions a book is from 6x9 inches to 5x7 inches.
As you lay out the book cover, and you determine the thickness of the spine, I have constructed a graph from previously published books which may help.
The plot on the vertical axis is of the number of pages in your book. The horizontal axis has the spine thickness of the published books.
As an example, from the graph, if your book is 300 pages, it would require a .7 inch spine.
As far the design of the cover, there is no set way do it. My suggestion is to spend time in a book store and see the different styles of book covers. That may stimulate your imagination. Let your imagination go and see where it takes you for a cover design.
There are however, three basic styles for a book cover:
A plain color with a lettering that stands out. An example of that choice might be a pure black cover, with a white lettering that stands in stark contrast.
An image that relates to the content of the story of the title of the book. A story which takes place in New York City could have an image of the Empire State Building on the cover.
A pattern or a design which hints of the content of the story. A complex mystery could very well have a convoluted pattern or even a maze.
Again, spending time at a book store and taking note of book covers can give you some good ideas.
The last item, when designing the book cover, don’t forget the material for the back cover. The back cover traditionally has a photograph of the author and/or a brief summary of the book.
