About a year ago, my friend Leland asked me if he could borrow my scanner. He had written a children’s story, he explained, and his then-11yo son Mekiah had illustrated it. He wanted to scan the pictures so that he could get the book printed. A bit more discussion, and the next thing I knew, can I borrow your scanner had turned into will you design my book.

We started by scanning the illustrations. Mekiah had drawn them in pencil, then used a lightbox to trace them over with ink. However, the pictures were not all the same size, and some had visible pencil or eraser marks. Leland and I spent a lot of time tweaking, resizing, and cleaning up the images. This was a good test of my Photoshop skills because with Leland sitting right next to me I felt like I had to be quick and efficient as well as accurate. I felt pretty smug when it occurred to me that I could get rid of a lot of the eraser marks simply by adjusting brightness and contrast.

Then we fired up InDesign and set up the master pages for the book. My font choice, Bell, was practically a no-brainer. Bell is perhaps my all-time favorite serif font, but I don’t find very many uses for it. It’s a little too quirky and beautiful for everyday use, and not as legible as I would like in smaller sizes. However, it’s perfectly suited for a children’s book, not just because of the larger size, but also because it’s reminiscent of Century Schoolbook, the quintessential children’s book font. Furthermore, the story partly takes place under the sea, and I thought that Bell’s elegant curves would reflect that very well.

Then the fun really began. Mekiah had worked with a professional artist, Anne Phillips, when he created the drawings. Leland, Anne, and I spent several afternoons crowded around my Mac, working out the composition of each page. Anne was fantastic. I learned so much from her. For the first time, I got to see Illustrator’s dreaded Pen Tool wielded by an expert. Not to mention a ton of keyboard shortcuts. And *cough* I showed her a couple of things in InDesign, too. Best of all, though, was the realization that the professional artist and I were speaking the same language and using the same methods — confirmation that my laboriously-acquired knowledge was legit.

And the most exciting moment of all? Leland might disagree, but for me, it was placing the bar code image on the back cover. I think it wasn’t until then that I really believed that there was going to be a real, true, actual book. Oh my goodness!

Throughout this process, of course, we were in contact with the printer, Bang Printing. We had some ups and downs along the way, for example, when there was some confusion about whether the book would be landscape- or portrait-oriented, and then when there was some confusion about whether the pages were supposed to be 10 or 10.5 inches wide. On the whole, however, I enjoyed working with them. They answered our questions quickly and helpfully, they finished the job on time, and the book looks great!

And what about the story? Well, I’ll tell you this: I think The Boy and the Shark is terrific. Kids and grownups seem to like it equally. It’s a fairy tale. It has sharks. And it was inspired by a historical event. Very cool.

We just recently went live with the companion website. Among other things, it describes the self-publishing process from his perspective. So, if you found this post interesting, you might want to check out his site, too.

Lessons learned:

• Rudiments of the Pen Tool and some keyboard shortcuts.
• Regarding the printer, get everything in writing. Send “just to confirm the details of our recent conversation” emails after every phone call.
• Do not sneer at self-published books. If Leland had gone the traditional route (he didn’t even consider it) there is no way he would have had this level of control over the finished product.