ROBUST discussion

I'm trying to get my books ready for Createspace. I've given up on their template and I'm laying it out myself, but I'm wondering - do I HAVE to start a new chapter on a new page? I know most books do, but books by Alexander McCall Smith don't. Nor does Morgan Llewelyn. It would save pages (and cost) if I could take out the page breaks and leave a set space.

No, you don't. If you do your own layout, you lock it into the PDF you deliver to Createspace.

Especially if your chapters are not named but just called "Chapter xx" it just looks stupid to have chapter heads.

Also, a good trick to add a spot of "unputdownability" to your text is not to have chapter breaks on new pages, but simply an empty linespace (or a violin hole or an asterisk in it, centred) and continue with the story.

There are many good reasons for doing what you want to do.

Oh, thank you, Andre! You've saved me from insanity. I spent ages last night trying to get the space breaks just right so that all my chapters started on a right hand page and my headers didn't land on a chapter page and it just wouldn't work. I'll change my space breaks to same page and save myself a lot of muddling and pages!

Phew!

If your chapters are named and you want them to start on a right hand page, just add a blank page with a single (empty, invisible) paragraph on it. It looks wasteful on paperbacks, though. Still, what Createspace makes is not paperbacks but trade editions, which are altogether classier, so readers may be readier to wear the ostentation of RH chapter heads. I'm just speculating here; personally, I'm not about to try it, as I think a small book like IDITAROD is expensive enough at €15 not to make it more expensive with empty pages.

Katie, it's just smarter altogether to do the layout in QuarkXPress or Adobe InDesign and export the file as a PDF, so that Createspace prints what you want it to print, not what it thinks the lowest common denominator of writers will accept.

First I'd have to learn how to use InDesign, Andre! I have it on my computer, but I've never quite got around to using it. Maybe I'll give it a go, though.

I've given up on the idea of right hand page chapter starts. I don't like blank pages. I think the idea of just having a space before a new chapter is much better. Then all I have to worry about is getting the numbering to start at the beginning of Section 2 - ie. the story. That will save a lot of pages, too.

You can switch of numbers on section start pages in Word.