You’ve been toiling for hours upon hours. Edited to a glossy shine, your manuscript is finally complete.

Unfortunately, a complete manuscript is not the same thing as a book interior. The difference is formatting.

If a complete manuscript is your masterpiece, consider formatting the frame in which your masterpiece is viewed. Proper framing enhances the work, while improper framing detracts. Even worse, nothing screams amateur quite as loudly as improper framing.

So how does one ensure proper framing?

For one, start sweating the details.

This example shows basic text written left justified on 8×11 paper. It is readable, but there is nothing to pull the eye to the page, let alone, a reader into a story.

1. Adjust your page size

When setting your book up for publishing you will be asked to specify a trim size, which is a fancy way of saying set your page length and width. You…