How to get help formatting a Pages book for publishing on Apple Books?

[neutrino17]

I’m writing a book I expect to publish on Apple Books. It will be for free. This is a retirement project. I’m using Pages to write the book.

I’m looking for two kinds of help.

1. Where do I find information about formatting this book to make it more likely to be accepted the first time after being submitted? I’ve been looking but haven’t found any style guides to follow apart from the normal guides for making a readable book. The sources on Apple web sites just tell you how to publish from Pages without indicating style suggestions.

2. Any suggestions about finding an editor? I have one or two places to look but more suggestions are helpful.

FYI:
Working title: “X-ray Microanalysis of Everyday Things”. When I was a kid I was always curious about what all the stuff around me was made of; rocks, metals, glass, brick, etc. Now I have a lab that can provide elemental analysis down to the micron level. Right now the fun chapter involves analyzing some of the dust particles that accumulate on my car if I don’t wash it for a while.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

To #1, I suggest finding books that present comparable content in ways that you appreciate and then replicate their presentations. Visiting a library and looking through many books or perhaps a store like Barnes & Noble should present many insights to guide you in laying out your own book.

To #2, running an ad is a fast path to finding editors looking for jobs or gigs.

One more idea: since you intend to give away this book, another option would be to publish it as a website instead of as a traditional book. That would get you much broader "distribution" than you can get in any published form or any published channel. This could even be a "living" website made up of ongoing blog entries presenting each topic/image.

You could "write" the book online as a series of quality blog entires over time and then edit it into an attractive layout (per #1) and self-publish it yourself if you want some tangible books to lay full claim to "published author." There are various print shops that can receive a digital file(s) and publish it in a hard cover book format.

 

[neutrino17]

The website idea has merit. Thanks.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

If you want to build your own list to potentially help influence a book deal, perhaps make a small number of the blog entries freely accessible- or better, a ROLLING quantity of them- with the rest of the archive requiring login. Motivate users wanting to see "the rest" to register. If you can make your own list big enough this way, book publishers get much more interested in publishing your book (and covering the editing too). In short: make it appear very easy for THEM to make money by publishing your book and they will be motivated. A big fat list of your own, active fans to which to offer the book on launch is an attractive starter pool of likely buyers. The bigger this number... the greater interest you would get from publishing partners.