The cover design has given me fits.

It took awhile to decide on the picture for the front of the book. Nope, not telling!

Then, I had to design the cover in my head. That wasn’t too hard – title, drawing, my name.

Then, this is where it gets hairy. Adobe InDesign is not an easy thing to use, and the world of covers is not a place where I have a map.

The printing company sent a diagram for the cover design with confusing dimensions and terms like “cloth size” and “board size” and all sorts of fractions that didn’t translate into clean decimals.

Then I saw that it was for a vertical book. Oops. My book is horizontal.

I requested and received a new diagram, which was just lines and measurements. Still no clarification on “cloth size” versus “board size”, and don’t even get me started on the whole issue of the spine dimensions!

It took the better part of an afternoon with InDesign, Googling for instructions, sending out an SOS to Carol in Seattle who was on a ferry returning from the San Juan Islands, which is where I want to live when I grow up, more googling, experimenting, and gritting my teeth with the effort of not screaming or slamming the laptop shut and picking up some nice soothing knitting.

I thought I got it. I sent it off. Then, the design department at the printing company sent me an email with a real template to use with InDesign so I redid it.

The person in the design department is named Jana. Why does that matter? Because I may be temporarily insane from the frustration of InDesign, which means everything takes on a new significance.

Perhaps it is time for a break. How about a nice cuppa?

So worked up here I forgot to mention the title of the book, The Cabins of Wilsonia,  in case Google is listening.