Deanna Estes is an experienced book design professional

I invited Deanna on the show precisely because she has more knowledge and experience than many other designers I know. I want to impress upon all of you that cover design, and inside design layout, and creating marketing materials to support the product (your book) is more than a thing of choosing a template in Canva. No offense to Canva, but your book is more important than that. 

You need a professional who has been doing this long enough to know how to wrap images around the entire book - to bring the inside out, so to speak. 

You need a professional who understands font choice, and layout both front and back. 

You need a professional who will work with you, with other designers (illustrators, for instance - did you know that? Different aspects of design create many differing expertise levels), and with publishers. 

As an author you will learn a boatload from this video

We talk fonts, cover colors, where to put your name - big and bold above the title, or not?

We talk running heads and odd pages and spacing between lines and paragraphs.

We talk full book design. Inside and out.

We talk spines. Do you have one?

We talk about the importance of loving your topic and your book overall.

We talk nephew art and I'm not telling you what that is. Watch the video and learn what's good or not good about nephew art.

And, we talk about when to start creating that book cover. Maybe right away. Maybe half-way through writing. Maybe at the end. Maybe you should watch and find out what Deanna thinks.

I don't ask you to believe the words on this blog page. I'd like it if you did, but if you're writing a book this year, you need to know all of this and will learn a lot of it from listening to Deanna here! And if you have not chosen your designer, I urge you to give Deanna a call.

In fact, she is offering a free half hour with her, during which time you can uncover a wealth of information and also receive her one page check list of things to know about book design. Leave a comment here or on the Youtube video, and Deanna or I, will get back to you. Deanna also invites you to email her: deanna (at) lotusdesign (dot) biz

Find her online at Lotus Design.  

Fiction or non-fiction, Deanna Estes will make you shine like the star you are (or aspire to be).

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