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How to make a book or booklet Set up your word processor or page layout program to produce two 5.5 by 8.5 pages side by side on an 8.5 by 11 sheet of paper. By copying on both sides of the paper you will get 4 book pages per sheet. (If this is hard to visualize, stack a few sheets of paper, fold the stack in half and then number the pages.) You can do this with a word processing program such as MS Word, by using the column feature. The trick is shuffling the pages around so that when it's copied page 2 will end up on the back of page 1, etc., and everything will come out in the right order, with the right page numbers. Doing this with a word processing program is probably feasible for a booklet. For a book it would be a lot of work. The best way to format a book is with a page layout program such as Microsoft Publisher. You can download a free 60-day trial. To produce your book or booklet, take your original copy to a copy shop. (Or you can give them your computer file on a disk, or send it via modem.) They will copy it double sided, then fold it (booklet) or cut the whole stack down the middle (book). If it's cut, the left stack goes upside down on top of the right stack and it's all in order. Then it needs binding. A booklet can be stapled in the middle. There are various ways of binding a book. Have them show you examples. Be sure to have the copy shop produce one copy of your book or booklet for you to go over carefully before they make any more of them. You want to make sure you've got it right so you don't waste money producing bad copies. Proofreading is important. |