When the layout is done and you're looking at those beautiful pages, it feels like that's it — all that's left is to hit a button. In reality, there's a whole stage between 'the layout is done' and 'the book is published' called prepress. And it demands just as much attention as anything that came before it.
Let's start with formats. If you want to sell a physical book, you need a PDF with very specific parameters. Not just any PDF — a PDF with bleed: an extra three to five millimeters around the edges that gets trimmed off during production. This is what keeps color or background from leaving a white sliver along the edge of the page. My designer handled this herself, but I still had to spell out clearly: which platform we were preparing the file for, what paper size, hardcover or paperback.
For the ebook, you need an epub — a special format that adapts to whatever screen it's displayed on. I ran into trouble with it: a table in one of the chapters looked perfect in the PDF and fell apart completely in epub. We ended up replacing the table with a list. Sometimes epub demands sacrifices from your design in the name of readability.
The audiobook is its own story, and I'll tell it in another post. But if you're planning audio alongside the text, start thinking early about who's going to narrate it. It might well be you. If so — try it, don't be shy.
ISBN is its own question. You need an International Standard Book Number if you want your book to show up in catalogues and libraries. Some platforms issue an ISBN for free when you publish; on others, you have to get one yourself. I got one when I printed my proof copies through an all-in-one platform — it's included in the price and you're assigned a number automatically. But keep in mind: you can't use that same number on other platforms; they'll issue you a different one there. I also went and got one on my own. It's not complicated.
Then there's the proof copy. Most print-on-demand platforms let you order a single copy before the official publication. Holding in your hands what was, only yesterday, just a document on a screen — that feeling is like nothing else. It's also a genuinely useful step, because you can catch mistakes in the proof and fix the files in time.
Once everything's checked, you hit 'publish.' Or 'submit for review,' if the platform vets its materials first.
Then an email arrives: 'Your book is published.' You open the page, see your cover, your name, the price — and realize it's real. Not a draft, not 'coming soon,' not 'almost.' A real book on a real website that anyone on the planet can buy.
That moment alone is worth every stage that led up to it.