ghostofamerica book design

5 — A Cat with a Bird in its Mouth

Spread opening chapter 5 with a column of running text in a warm literary serif facing a full-bleed illustration
My friend was an early beta reader. I gave her a bound copy printed on copy paper and told her to be careful, watch the edges, don't get paper cuts. She used a piece of canvas to protect her fingers. It just happened to have her own colorful, original artwork on the piece of canvas, and when she returned the story to me with her notes, she gifted me the canvas. I felt the connection between her painting and the story immediately, so it became the cover illustration for the book.
Spread of running narrative text continuing the chapter, set in the same warm serif with generous leading and a quiet folio
After the chapter begins with a solid, unmistakeable chapter number, it dissolves into image and verse. I don't always use such brutal chapter markers, but in a book with such a mixed form, I feel they are a helpful ground to readers, a place to land in between.
Page 43 holding a watercolor illustration of a bird skull rendered in soft, bleeding washes of grey and rust
For prose chapter openings, I typically start about halfway down the page. The fable-like quality of this story called for a drop-cap. The font is Powell. It feels serendipitous that it is such a shape-shifting font, legible at small sizes, revealed to be intricate and complex at larger sizes.
Spread of running text resuming after the illustration, set in the same warm serif and single-column grid
The text resumes its single-column grid as though nothing happened — the watercolor's quiet aftershock left to work on the reader silently, with no caption or comment to explain it away.
Page 45 with the chapter title set in a heavy blackletter face and a large illuminated drop capital 'O' opening the first paragraph
I like tracking position with informative folios, but for them to be as close to invisible as possible. The breaks in this book employ a disruptive technique, calling back the artwork that opens the chapter. Disruptions become patterns, patterns become ground.
Spread showing a mostly blank divider page marked simply 'page 5,' set in small type at the foot of the page
The book is mixed-genre, elements blend between word and design to deepen the story without exposition. Not all books need this many elements, and I'm happy to keep it simple when the work calls for simplicity, but I also love being experimental with form.