As a design educator, I’m often asked to critique book covers. The most common stumbling block is typography. Here are some simple tips for designers and do-it-yourselfers.

1. Title text often tends to crowd the space. Ideally it should either sit comfortably within the cover and have some breathing room, or alternatively, it should expand past the margins altogether and bleed off the page.

2. Though it’s common to center text on book covers, I rarely center text unless I’m designing a wedding invitation or the lines of text are roughly similar in length. The eye likes to jump to a left edge to read the next line and with centered text, it has to hunt for where the next line begins. Centered text is a natural and logical, but predictable approach. With a little exploration, there are almost always more elegant solutions.

3. Setting text on top of a photo is often difficult. The common solution is to add bevels, glows and drop shadows. Better to use photos with large areas of light, dark or solid color. Photoshop filters look like the hand of a computer – not the hand of an artist.

4. Never ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever stretch or compress type. Look around and you’ll find poorly made signs where the middle of the “S” is disproportionately fattened by compressing the text. There are compressed and extended typefaces designed to do that job without losing their proportions. It’s like staring into a fun house mirror.

5. Use comic sans; go to jail. It’s the law.

6. Understand the temporal context of your type choices. Most people choose type indiscriminately from a dropdown menu offering 200 choices without any awareness of whether the typeface is classic or cliche. A friend of mine has art nouveau type on the titles of his self-designed martial arts/vampire books. It’s incongruous, but he doesn’t even know it. Different typefaces have the ability to place your work in the correct-or incorrect-temporal setting. When I first started working with computers, I couldn’t understand what was so futuristic about the typeface Futura. Later, I learned that when Paul Renner designed it in 1929, it was part of a modernist, progressive revolution in geometric sans-serif typefaces. It was futuristic for it’s time, and though it’s still used and useful, it suggests more of a 1930′s feel than a futuristic one.

7. When designing ANYTHING, do some research. Look at book covers by pros like Chipp Kidd. One of my favorite “design bibles” is a book of Blue Note album covers designed by Reid Miles in the 1950s and 60?s. As a matter of fact, the cover of my most recent book was intentionally adapted from his album covers to establish that very point. My design students typically sit down at a computer and start moving text and images around, hoping to come up with something inspiring. This is the “white cane” approach to design. You can come up with something perfectly original based on the work of brilliant people who came before you. Your work will be better, and you’ll grow as a designer by assuming their vocabulary.

8. Challenge yourself to write a colophon for your book-even if you don’t include it in the content. This is the section where you explain your choices of typeface, imagery, color, etc. If you can’t justify it, it’s uninformed choice – not conscious design.

A book cover is not a box or a label. It’s a visual poem that has to immediately create interest in readers. It may be attractive, and it may be legible, but it has to exert its own gravitational pull. A very small percentage of covers achieve this. Like many things in life, book cover designs are often ruined by the things we don’t know we don’t know. Keeping a few simple rules in mind and exposing yourself to the work of brilliant designers is the fastest path to success whether you’re an experienced pro or just starting out on your first cover.

Dave Bricker is a novelist and the author of The One Hour Guide to Self-Publishing: Straight Talk for Fiction and Nonfiction Writers About Producing and Marketing Your Own Books. He teaches Graphic and Interactive design at an arts University in Miami. Read more about self-publishing on his blog at http://www.oneHourSelfPub.com

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So…You’ve done the final edit. Now what?

Among the many steps you still have to take is: page design.

Page design? Big deal you might say. What I need is a great cover for my book.

Your potential reader has perhaps 5 seconds to look at your cover. Maybe 10 seconds or more to read the back of your book, before deciding if they want to open it and scan the first few pages.

Consider the fact that your reader will spend the rest of the time ‘inside the book.’

Is it easy to read? Even though it may be all text, and no graphics, is it pleasing to the eye? Does the layout appear inviting? Are there ‘rivers’ running through paragraphs or improperly justified text?

Your readers do not want to struggle to read what you have to share with them. The proper page layout can give your book that crucial professional feel and look to a prospective buyer. They may look at the front and back covers, but if considering a purchase will almost always quickly skim a portion of the inside of the book as well. Don’t put yourself at a disadvantage.

Page design consists of many things: the font, the leading, kerning, character spacing, the styles applied to the text, the chapter headings.

There may be more decisions that need to be made in the interior than to the cover, depending on your project.

If you’re working with a publisher who allows you to furnish your copy, camera ready, or planning to publish under your own imprint, then consider finding a page designer who can work directly with you, helping you to find the right format, the ‘right feel’ for your words.

Most publishers, especially on-line publishers, may give you cookie cutter samples, if any, of page design, to match their cookie cutter covers.

This is your story, novel, memoir– your book. It should look and feel as if you were an integral part of it, not just another customer.

Whatever the genre, you may consider turning it over to a company that will process it as another business project: cover, page design, etc. Or you may decide to consult an editor to refine it, a graphic artist to design the cover, and a page designer for the interior.

And speaking of covers, consider your options there also.

Trying to discuss design issues with someone over the phone or by email can be frustrating. Such terms as bleed, CMYK, Pantone matches, blending and shading of elements, balance, font size and text effects may have you scratching your head. Will you own the rights to the artwork when it is completed? You spent all this time writing your book, now this?

It is ultimately your decision. Find the professional to help make your book everything it is meant to be. An expression of your self, a message, a story, that wants to be read.

Nancy Frederich is a writer and editor who does page, cover design and production for Sirena Press, an imprint of Murmaid Publishing in St. Petersburg, Florida. She has done layout, graphic work and written for several organizations and local newspapers, including her own weekly publication. She can be contacted at 727.403.1551 or murmaid@tampabay.rr.com.