Submitting Final Files to the Printer

🚀 We are so close to LAUNCH DAY and I couldn’t be more excited. Thank you to all of those that have signed up to be part of the LAUNCH CREW. I will be sending out an email this week with more details! If you are interested, there is still time to join in!

🗓️ PUBLISH DATE is MAY 22

So, it looks like this thing might actually happen…

I’m not going to bury the lead on this one. Last week I reached a HUGE MILESTONE in this process to publish my first kid’s book. I sent my final files to the printer! What that means is that I have finished all the illustrations, including the cover, and have a final manuscript ready to publish! Here is a quick update on some things that happened in each of these areas!

📝 MANUSCRIPT || In my previous email I talked about partnering with a copy editor to get a second set of eyes and make sure I wroted good. 😉 She checked the manuscript twice: once for content and once for punctuation. It was such a helpful process. It also helped me hit one of my first goals to get the word count down. At the start I was sitting around 1,200 and my goal was to get between 800-1,000. Happy to share that my final word count was 826!

📖 INTERIOR FILES || To create the right type of files for the interior pages, I did a lot of research. I learned what things like trim and bleed meant and how to set up a template for my pages. I created everything in an iPad app called Procreate (because I am not skilled enough for Photoshop). I saw online that this program could export the right type of final files, but it turned out they can’t. [plot twist!] So it was back to the internet for more research. I finally found another app called Affinity Designer that could export the right file type. If I hadn’t have done this step, the colors would have been much darker than I wanted.

📕COVER || I created a final cover that I wasn’t 100% in love with but when I went to submit my files I found that I didn’t use the right template. [facepalm] And I couldn’t just move things around. I had to redesign it. This was so frustrating because I thought I was done with illustrations. However, sometimes setbacks can actually help you make things better. I think this is definitely true of the cover. What do you think?

My goal of the cover was to highlight the type of illustrations in the book as well as create some intrigue around the boy. Hopefully young readers will be excited to open and read this when they see it!

With all three of these components ready, I submitted the final files to IngramSpark, my printer, for review. Shortly after, I received an eProof, made a few changes, approved it for printing, and ordered a physical copy for me to review. Now the only thing between me and publishing this book is if I find something majorly wrong when I get the physical copy!

🎉 Publish Date is scheduled for May 22! Who is ready?

👨‍💻LIFE UPDATE | I shared in my last email that I had left my job and was currently looking for a new role. I am happy to share that I have landed a role as the Chief Marketing Officer at an amazing company called Provisions Group here in Franklin, TN. In the Bible, when people took a step out in faith, God always provided provisions for their journey. It’s not lost on me that this is the name of the company where I landed after stepping out in faith.

Thanks for reading,
Kacy