my first book finally arrived
OK, so I have been complaining here all week about not getting my book, so I figured it’s only fair to even out the scoreboard. My book arrived this afternoon. It is a 13×11 hardcover/dust jacket with premium paper, 158 pages. Order was placed 12/7. Received today (12/19) with next day shipping. The book itself is quite good. For what I paid for it I think it was a good value. The premium paper is basically matte but there was a bit of glare when I was looking at it under fairly direct halogen light. The colors are quite vibrant, expecially the greens. The text is very sharp. I have no instances of photos being too dark. Although there are several dusk photos that are not as sharp as I would like. Several other full bleed pages have similar issues with a certain softness. My guess is they would be much sharper on glossy paper. The front and back covers look very good, but again they are a little soft as is the photo on the front flap. There are some glue spots on the copyright/title page and last page of the book. The spine also doesn’t feel especially secure to me. But I think that is being quite nitpicky. The pages have a bit of "wave" to them when you view the closed book from the top. I don’t know if that is typical of a book with so many pages. So, overall now that I have gotten my book I am relatively pleased with the results. Again I think it was a good value. My book is a document of my recent vacation trip. I would have paid as much if not more for prints and an album. If you need really top-notch printing you will probably want to search elsewhere; or you will really have to work your images to make them totally work their best with this paper and Blurb’s printers. The old saying "you get what you pay for" applies though I believe. The quality of the book I had made last year by MyPublisher.com is definitely higher, but for a 100 page 15×11 book (their max size) I would have ended up paying about $300 instead of $100 at Blurb.
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