A book is finished being bound. Finally! {BIG SMILE}

The book I've been binding is done. I've finished hand-binding the short stories I found in the Secret World Chronicle series. This includes stories by Mercedes Lackey, Steve Libbey, and Veronica Giguere. (Cody Martin and Dennis Lee have also contributed to the series, but I didn't find any short stories by them.) {Smile}

To the best of my knowledge, this is legal as a copy of ebooks I own. {Smile}

Please don't mind the eraser in some of the pictures. It was the most convenient paperweight to hand. {Smile, wink}

 

This is the front cover. Waterproof buckram, a type of bookcloth, comes in solid colors only; fortunately, I do like red. {Smile}

 

This is the title page. The "READING COPY: NOT FOR SALE" line is technically not required by copyright law. It just seemed like a good way to show respect for the author's work, and also for the limits of what you can do with ebooks. {Smile}

 

 

This is the back of the title page, and the first page of the table of contents. {Smile}

This is the second page of the Table of contents. {Smile}

I hope I found all the stories. I did try. {wink, Smile}

Anne Elizabeth Baldwin

Another Bound Book

Well, I bound another book. I know one of the authors, so I got permission to show it off. Well, she gave her permission, and assured me her co-author would like it, too. So here it is, a hand-bound, print version of Broken by Cedric Johnson and Veronica Giguere:

 

 

Here’s my title page, with the cover as a frontispiece. I think that turned out very nicely, if I may say so myself. {SMILE, wink}

 

 

And here’s my cover. It’s plainer than I’d like, but I haven’t found a satisfactory picture to add between the title and authors. I’m looking for one that suits the near-future cyberpunk story. I thought maybe a circuit diagram, but I haven’t found one that felt right yet. {Smile}

No, I can’t just use the official cover. At the large size inside, it would risk damaging the cover. At a size small enough not to do that, it doesn’t look like much. That’s why it’s a frontispiece now, and the cover is yellow, with easy to read letters in red. {chuckle, Smile}

And if you wonder about the story I enjoyed enough to do this for, Here it is at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Broken-ebook/dp/B00F1HUJSA/#

And here it is at Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/354126

I used Smashwords, because I suspected I’d want a hardcopy, and they make that easy. Obviously I did, so that worked great. {BIG SMILE}

Anne Elizabeth Baldwin

P.S. If you're wondering what you're looking at, that's my best approximation of a Japanese stab binding, with cardstock covers reinforced by tissue-tape made specially for book repair. I'm particularly happy with how the reinforcing turned out. Compared to the last thick book I bound in this style, the covers are curling much less, and they don't feel like they're liable to rip out if I forget to handle them carefully. (This one is slightly thinner which might help the latter problem. Still, the change is dramatic enough, at least some must be due to the reinforcing.) {Smile}

A.E.B.
 

A book for my cousin

With my recent bookbinding, since I hadn’t done the oriental binding style recently, and didn’t have instructions, Dad recommended I make a blank book as practice before tackling the one I wanted to keep. That sounded like a very good idea to me. I thought it turned out pretty well. {Smile}

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/345229127658026820/>

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In fact, I thought it turned out well enough to give away. One of my cousins loves handmade things. Even better, she’s an artist herself, so she can always use another sketch book. So I wrote to her, told her about it, and asked if she’d like it. I also asked if she’d like me to try to color the strings with a permanent marker, since sort of white strings don’t stand out well against offwhite covers. I told her which colors of permanent markers Dad and I had found that currently have working ink in them. {GRIN}

She very much wanted the book, and chose blue strings. I thought she liked blue. {BIG GRIN}

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/345229127658279201/>

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I think that looks even better. I showed it to my cousin, and she loves it. Now I just have to get around to mailing it. {SMILE, wink}

Anne Elizabeth Baldwin

P.S. Clicking the pins will take you to bigger pictures. Clicking again, to even bigger pictures. {Smile}

A.E.B.

Books I’ve Bound

I uploaded a picture of two books I’ve bound to Pinterest and Facebook last week. I meant to mention that here sooner. Maybe it’s just as well I didn’t; a conversation recently started on Pinterest is taking an interesting turn. I had no reason to direct you to it earlier, but it might be worth a peek. {SMILE}

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/345229127658132057/>>

In any case, these are the two books I’ve bound that I’ve kept and recently found. Most either stayed with the library that owned the, or went to friends and relatives as gifts, but not these two. {Smile}

The one on the left is bound in Occidental signature style. It's the very first book I bound, so it has a couple of errors I don't make anymore. Fortunately, they don't show much in this picture. {GRIN}

The one on the right is bound in my best guess at Oriental side-sewn style. I wish I could find instructions. I'm sure they'd save me some trial-and-error learning. {chuckle, lop-sided Smile}

Anne Elizabeth Baldwin

GLUE!

My glue arrived today! {REALLY BIG GRIN, HUMONGOUS GRIN}

Oh, I know it’s silly to get excited about glue, but this isn’t student’s white glue, or even carpenter’s wood glue. Those you can find in many stores in most decent-sized town. No, this is acid-free book binder’s glue. (I’d had some, but mine had gone lumpy. I’m not using that glue, not even the still-liquid parts around the lumps.) There was one store in Hilo that carried it maybe a decade ago, but I think they closed. So it was make a special trip that would quite likely be fruitless, or hop on the web. I found DEMCO, a library supplies firm I’ve ordered from before, and they still had the kind I’d ordered before. It did work great, until it went lumpy. However, Amazon had some, too, and they’ll give you free shipping on large-enough orders. DEMCO won’t, and they will insist you give them your phone number if they’re going to send you anything. Amazon doesn’t. So I ordered a pint from Amazon, along with some acid free coverboards and a friend’s book that I’ve been meaning to order, to make the order big enough to qualify for that free shipping.

They wrote back promising to send the coverboards immediately, and the glue with the book when it comes out in January.

{groan, rub face} It’s the glue I want immediately! The coverboards can wait; Mom wants a paperback cause it’s lighter and takes less space. So I ordered another pint, and a few books that have been sitting on my wishlist long enough to be in danger of dropping out of print. They promised to send that order more promptly, glue and all. {Smile}

I still expected them to show up around the middle of the month. Nope. Today I got two packages. One had the coverboards, and the other had four books and both pints of glue. Yes, both pints. I’m not quite sure how that happened, but I’m certainly not complaining! {SMILE}

Anyway, now I can bind the booklet I promised to Mom. I can also bind a couple of books I found on the web that appear to be in the public domain that I think she’ll like. But she won’t get those until one or another of the upcoming gift occasions. With Christmas on December 25th, her and Dad’s anniversary on December 27th, and her birthday on January 21st, we have enough occasions coming soon. {SMILE}

Anne Elizabeth Baldwin