Off to the printers…

A Peaceful Good Friday to you, if you happen to observe today.

Mortal Touch has gone off to Lulu for the Advance Reading Copies, or “galleys,” for the pre-publication distribution. I finished the proofreading, made the changes and exported the file into PDF according to the specs Lulu gives on its website. I opened it up in Adobe Reader and it looked good. I had a little trouble uploading it to Lulu and I’m not sure why–it didn’t like the version I FTP’d, and I did it again using Lulu’s online upload button and it told me the file was already there. But I looked at what they call “the press ready PDF” converted from what I uploaded and it’s all there, right to the last page, and it looks okay.

Then I had a little problem with the cover.

I created a one-piece cover to Lulu’s exact specs, using their “wizard” to calculate the spine width to the hundredth of a point and setting it up exactly, 1/8″ bleed all around even though the cover is plain white. I wrote a bio and a cover blurb and added the information recommended by one of the self-publishing list members, as my numerous books are very sketchy about what to put on the ARC covers and where. However, when I went through the “cover upload wizard” on Lulu, I seemed to run into a glitch. I wasn’t sure it was uploading, and the page wouldn’t change to the “Continue” button. What threw me, however, was that my cover appeared as thumbnails on the project page! How weird is that? Unless PDF’s up-load their own thumbnails, and that’s all that went through?

I am fairly new to the esoteric world of PDF files, so I’ll have to figure all this out. Unfortunately, I ordered some copies of the book–feeling on a tight schedule to get the Advance Review Copies out–and only THEN looked at the “press ready PDF” of the cover–and it was wrong! The thumbnails were my cover but the “press-ready PDF,” which is what goes on the book, was Lulu’s generic cover! Ack! Ack! And they normally don’t let you cancel orders because with print-on-demand it’s like going to a copy shop: the minute your order goes in, they shoot it right off to be printed and bound. Obviously, if there’s not a problem, you WANT them to be as fast as possible, right?

So, I logged into Lulu’s online live chat help. “Gene” cancelled my order (whew!) but couldn’t figure out what was going on with the cover. I ended up completely redoing the cover in InDesign (not a biggie, it’s just text) with slightly different parameters, saving it as a brand new PDF file and uploading it again. This time the upload prompts appeared correctly, the “Continue” button appeared, and now MY cover appears as the press-ready PDF. So, I think we’re all set.

I set the book as “available to the public” on Lulu so all of you reading this can take a look online if you want, but it’s really not for sale–this is just a galley, that’s why it doesn’t have an EAN barcode on it. (You CAN buy it, but for heaven’s sakes, don’t, it’s going to have a wicked cover when I get that done!) I’ve ordered just ONE proof copy, and if that arrives and looks okay, THEN I’ll order the dozen or so ARC copies for the prepubs. Sheesh. I learned the costs of being over-hasty! 🙁 Thank you, Gene, at Lulu support!

Now I’m all stressed. 🙁

Anyway, here’s the page at Lulu (This is JUST THE GALLEY! The real book comes out in July!). I’ll be making it unavailable in a day or so because if pre-pub reviewers see it for sale anywhere (and I’m told they do check), that’s it, your book goes in the trash can and they don’t trust you in the future. The big pre-pubs are apparently VERY strict about this. And given what they mean for sales potential, we must respect that. Take a peek.