There is so much that goes into books and stories, and the biggest thing that keeps the books from going to my head to your hands is formatting. Okay, well, there’s a lot more that kinda makes it difficult, but formatting is a really big one, okay?

I could have a fully edited and complete story sitting in a nice pretty file (I do, in fact, have several) but it can still take months before I can get it to you. Why? Because every book needs to be formatted to look nice. Have you ever thought about the fact that in most books, the inner margin needs to be larger than the outer margins to compensate for the inner pages meeting and unfolding at the spine? Yeah, I didn’t know that until I tried to print Sun Racer without doing that and half of the text was disappearing into the center of the book.

There’s also things like page headers and page numbers, getting those aligned properly and into separate sections. Make sure the font is the right size, comfortable enough to read without making your book three inches thick. And the cover design! It takes long enough just to create the art, but takes even longer to get the title and author name properly aligned. I have a stack of failed print books sitting on my shelf that were just me trying to figure out how to center the cover art on the book. And then, if you’re doing a hardcover, you have to make an entirely separate piece of art because you need more room for the cover to fold over the cover of the book.

All of that to say… it takes a very long time to format a book. Especially when I’m one person doing all of it. Nevertheless, I will not let that stop me. I have a good handful of stories that are all ready to be formatted and sent off for printing. At least once a month, I will keep you updated on what books are in the works and which ones will be ready!

Thank you so much for your patience, everyone. Its hard to believe that people actually want to read what I have written, but it is such an honor to share it with you all.

Happy reading and happy writing, everyone!