An Amazon reviewer grasped the exact concept we had in mind when designing The Great Forgetting:

There is a bit of artistic tension between the book’s numinous subject matter and its design. The format is that of a child’s picture book, with short passages of text next to images. This is a novel idea that works well, since images can engage parts of us which words can’t reach. Plus the format takes us back to our early years, when the world was alive, and “read me a story” often led to frightening, wonderful experiences which further enlivened that world. The designer, Cecilia Sorochin, has placed imagery within every pair of facing pages – except in one place, and there is a message in that omission.

I find myself more interested in the world of apps, but I come across few apps I want to buy or even download for free.

I am reading a lot more lately, a lot of e-books, and there are plenty of e-books I want to buy. So what’s the problem?

Time

The amount of time I have for reading long-form narratives (say, 300 pages/80,000 words) is limited. Currently, I can reasonably read anywhere from 10 – 15 books a year. Some years ago I might have read 20 – 25 books a year, even though at that time I would buy on average more than 100 books a year. Most of those titles languished on my shelves. I simply could not have gone into a bookstore without buying at least one and usually two books.

Note: my e-book buying habits are very different. I don’t buy an e-book unless I know I have time to read it right then. I’m buying many less books now, except for the rare occasion when I still frequent a print bookstore. (That occasion is rare since I live in rural Argentina where no bookstores exist for miles.)

I love long-form narratives, both fiction and non-fiction. These works engage my imagination, exercising the mind. They don’t need enhancing with audio or video. That’s something different, other forms of narrative. I like those too, but not intermixed with my e-books.

With all my fondness for massive chunks of text, why are apps so appealing?

Apps stimulate my mind in ways not possible with long-form narratives. Apps have the potential to make more use of our senses.

There’s a full-color screen. Make use of it. Carefully. Thoughtfully. Words and letters are simply graphic marks that convey meaning. Visual communication through design presents other ways of enhancing meaning of words and letters when used intelligently.

Along with the graphical ways in which an app is structured and presented, there are the photographic, audio, and video aspects. Not all that need be present in every app. The app should focus more on substance and not overwhelm with possibilities.

Apps present opportunities for structuring and designing content into easier to grasp, bite-size components.

When time is a factor (as it usually is in most of our lives), then apps become a form of snacking on content or perhaps a small meal in itself. But I still want intellectual content with that. Not junk food. Most apps these days are still candy bars but apps also can be like pear & broccoli. More quality content is needed in the app world. It’ll come, I’m sure. I suspect at some point in 2011 I will spend more money buying apps than buying e-books.

Meanwhile, here’s a nice free app – a piece of broccoli – to snack on from the Poetry Foundation. Love the spin feature!

What has bought about my change in reading habits? The shift from print to digital. Could it be the iPad? No. Could it be the Kindle? No, not on its own. It’s the handy, little iPod Touch.

A couple of years ago I scoffed at the notion that any serious reader would even bother reading on the iPhone and its miniature screen. Surely that couldn’t be comfortable, so I thought. Then I tried it. Works for me. It’s not the optimal reading device but the iPod Touch is incredibly comfortable to me for reading.

I’ve always done much of my reading in bed at night. That worked well when I didn’t have to worry about bothering anyone with light from the bedside lamp. But now I read mostly in a room that is entirely dark. Try that with a Kindle.

Someone will surely scream, “You’ll ruin your eyes.” I’m not sure. Certainly it can’t be worse than reading in very low light. But my eyes feel quite comfortable with the display if I turn the brightness down to the lowest setting and set the page background to a creamy yellow. (I also prefer my print books on a cream colored paper rather than bright white.)

I do find the Kindle an acceptable e-reading device but the need for a light source is somewhat irritating, but maybe that’s just me. And I’m certainly not anti-Kindle or attempting to argue that the iPod Touch should be everyone’s choice for e-reading. I do like using the Kindle app for the iPod Touch. Ultimately, I think the Kindle app on various platforms is going to be more important than the Kindle itself.

But I love reading in the dark. I’m again spending a couple of hours reading each night. I’ve missed that. Glad to have reading back in my life.

Over the past few months my reading has shifted entirely to digital.

That’s largely due to circumstance. Down here in rural Argentina it’s not easy to come across a bookstore, particularly any stocking more than a few titles in English. What is a heavy reader like myself supposed to do? Even though I have a stockpile of unread books in print, I’ve always been one to want more reading material. Constantly. Digital serves that purpose.

I wonder if I still lived back in the U.S. (or some area with reasonable access to a well-stocked bookstore, library, or even reliable Amazon deliveries) if my reading habits would have changed this dramatically. I tend to think not. Even now, if I really had the choice then I would choose print. But that’s largely a personal fondness for printed books. Yet, maybe not.

The technologies are evolving rapidly. I can now envision a future without print books, but POD might provide that option for a long time to those who prefer their reading printed. I have long thought that the only printed books that would survive as off-set productions would be highly designed books that made use of quality paper and materials. That probably will survive as a niche market. But with the rapid adoption of tablets (iPad, for now), then even those books will have a digital counterpart. All of those books will have beautifully designed digital versions. Some buyers/readers will prefer digital, some will choose the gorgeous print version.

I don’t sense the physical book will be dead in 5 years, as predicted. But that point is certainly hurtling towards us faster than I would have thought a year or two ago. Ultimately, maybe it will be a generational change, another ten to fifteen years: 2020-2025.

Ah, and my choice of e-reading platform? It’s mobile but not what you think. More on that in the next post.

Can one say that designing a book can change your life?

Certainly.

We often hear that books change people’s lives. I myself have been shaped by the books I’ve read over the years. But that was reading. This time I had the experience of designing the book that would change my life.

Toward the end of last year we received a 4-page manuscript by an author bearing the improbable name, “Calvin Luther Martin.”

Reading the manuscript was not like reading 4 pages of a magazine, or 4 pages of Nietzsche. It was like entering a forest inside oneself to ask, “Who are we?”  Then opening the mind to discover the answer.

The text blew me away. Rich in imagery. The potential was enormous.

Let me add a footnote, here. Most authors & editors would find it hard to let go of a manuscript and give the designer this flexibility: it changes the book’s shape into a new one, it requires trust. Of course the work is a collaboration. Finding the right image and the right letter size for each word requires flexibility from both parties. Understanding that the voice is the manuscript’s and not anyone else’s is the first rule.

Cutting the text

I was given absolute freedom to design this book and cut the text into the appropriate pages and even paragraphs. After reading the manuscript a few times, the cuts became obvious. The breaks needed to occur every time I had to stop, breathe, reflect, think.

We didn’t have a page count at the beginning of the project (since it depended on where the text was going to be cut). Finally, it came out to a 72 page book printed in 120grm neo matte, full color — quite a beauty!

Layout style

The layout style required breathing space, allowing the mind to wander, reinforcing the line of text with images while not overwhelming the reader. A discourse where white space, letters and images play a part on each page to tell a story. Images can be used as words—and letters can be used as images—to deliver the message to the reader.

Images

The book ended up with about 40 images—photos & illustrations that range from the photograph of a sheet of paper to a painting of “The Wing of a Roller” by Albrecht Dúrer, to Jesus on the cross. Whatever conveyed the message, whatever propelled the mind in the right direction was used.

Typography

After designing a few pages, I realized we would be changing sizes, spacing, and using the letters as images. For this task I wanted a classic roman family, with clear letterforms, without much contrast between the thin & thick parts, not distracting from the words—or the images formed by the words. From a shortlist of transitional families, I decided to go with ITC New Baskerville.

Book Cover

Early in the process we agreed on the “missing ‘I’” for the title. Only later, after absorbing the book, does the reader discover the ‘I’  on the back cover, illustrated by the images of the book, just as letters were illustrated in illuminated manuscripts. For, like those, this book is illuminating.

Website

Uncluttered, with plenty of white space. The website keeps the essence of the book. A place not only to click to buy the book but to go back after reading it.