Okay.Now they really did it.
So, about fifteen minutes after I shut off the computer yesterday, the dogs started barking. A package arrived. I was finally holding the galley pages for in the path of falling objects, and they look incredible.
I know... what do you expect? It's not like you'd find a parent complaining his newborn is ugly or anything. And it's just black print on white paper, after all. But there's more to it than that, and I think people outside the publishing industry sometimes don't realize all the intricate steps involved in making a book. And how the words look on the paper is a lot bigger than you might think.
Well, I think the artist involved in this step "got it" on a number of levels.
First of all, I really wanted the title of the book (and my name) to be kept as all lower case, and the artist did this, and chose a perfect, rounded, and subtle typeface for doing this.
But it's the inner pages that really work for the story. First of all, in the path of falling objects is told on a number of levels: there are little bits of verse (very little), letters, chapters with punchy headings that are frequently assigned to different characters, and jarring, short blasts of tense/voice changes (I won't explain any further); and all of these elements contribute so much more to the completeness of a "book" when they present properly: with balanced white space, pagination, orientation, and size.
I think you'll agree when you see the book. It really looks great.
Now, time for me to comb through it for any mistakes.
Oh yeah... tomorrow I will be reading from Ghost Medicine (and maybe I'll read a bit of in the path of falling objects, too) at the Santa Clarita Valley Literacy and Arts Festival at William S. Hart Park in Old Town Newhall starting at 11:00.
Maybe I'll see you there.
