Now that you have your front matter and chapter files complete, it’s time to do the backmatter files. The back of your book should include a teaser, or excerpt, for your next book as well as an author biography and links to your other books.

Setting Up an Introduction to an Excerpt and Excerpt

To set up your book’s Introduction to Excerpt page, perform the following steps:

1. Choose File > New > Document
2. Select the preset template you set up earlier
3. Choose File > Save As and give it a logical filename without spaces (such as introexcerpt.indd)
4. Apply master page C
5. Adjust the text block to start 2 inches from the top margin
6. Choose Window > Paragraph Styles
7. Type your introduction, click Return and type the title of the next book
8. From the Paragraph Style palette, apply the Dedication paragraph style to the first line and the Title paragraph style to the title of your next book
9. Choose Page > Insert Page to add a second page
10. Type or copy and paste your excerpt text
11. Apply the Body paragraph style to your excerpt text
12. Ensure your file ends on an even page (add a blank back page, if necessary)
13. Choose File > Save.

Setting Up an Author Biography Page

To set up your author biography page, perform the following steps:

1. Choose File > New > Document
2. Select the preset template you set up earlier
3. Choose File > Save As and give it a logical filename without spaces (such as bio.indd)
4. Apply master page C
5. Adjust the text block to start 2 inches from the top margin
6. Choose Window > Paragraph Styles
7. Type “About the Author”, click Return and type your biography
8. From the Paragraph Style palette, apply the Title paragraph style to the first line and apply the Body paragraph style to the biography text
9. Choose Page > Insert Page to add a second page, which you’ll leave blank if you have no additional books to list
10. Choose File > Save.

Setting Up a Links Page

When readers finish a book, it’s a good idea to give them an easy way to find and download the next book or discover other books they may not have read. InDesign makes it easy to encode the links to your other books. If you include this Links file in your paperback book, your links will appear as URLs. For the ebook, the links will appear as live, clickable links. To create a links page, perform the following steps:

1. On the page following your author biography, type a heading like “Other Books by Jane Doe”.
2. From the paragraph Style palette, apply the Title paragraph style
3. Type the entire URL of your other books separated by line breaks (each line must begin with http://)
4. Click and drag to highlight the first URL
5. Choose Type > Hyperlinks & Cross-References > New Hyperlink from URL
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 for the rest of your URL
7. Choose File > Save.

Adding Your New Files to Your Bookfile

Now you just need to add your new files to your bookfile.

With your InDesign book file active:

1. Click the + at the bottom to add a file. Start with the file introexcerpt.indd (or whatever files you have created since last populating your book file).
2. Continue to add files until all are included.
3. Click and drag the files up or down to rearrange them within the bookfile.
4. From the bookfile palette menu (upper right corner), choose Save Book.

Checking Your Files

Before converting your book for various formats,

1. Ensure your chapters’ first pages have appropriate master pages applied
2. Ensure all other pages have appropriate master pages applied
3. Apply any paragraph or character styles you may have missed
4. Choose File > Save for all your changed/updated files.

Setting Up Numbering

Although page numbering isn’t necessary for ebooks, it helps you navigate your book and is necessary for the print version. To set up numbering, perform the following steps:

1. in your bookfile, click once to highlight your first chapter
2. From the bookfile pallet menu, choose Document > Numbering Options

1. Click Start Page Numbering at: and insert 1 in the field
2. Click OK

1. In the bookfile, click once to highlight Chapter2
2. From the bookfile palette menu, choose Document Numbering Options
3. Click Automatic Page Numbering
4. Click OK
5. With no files selected, from bookfile palette menu, choose Update Numbering > Update All Numbers
6. From bookfile palette menu, choose Save Book.

Double-check your page numbering by opening a few files. Make any corrections where necessary and repeat the steps above to update the numbering. Be sure to save your bookfile.

Now you’re ready to output a PDF for a printed book.

Creating a PDF for Your Printed Book

If you’ll be making your book available in paperback, you’ll need a print-ready PDF file. Perform the following steps:

1. From the bookfile palette menu, choose Export Book to PDF
2. Do not allow blank pages to be discarded
3. View the PDF in Acrobat
4. Fix any errors in the source file(s)
5. Create (hopefully) the final PDF
6. Make final PDF read-only or apply security

In the next post, you’ll create and add a table of contents file and output the epub and Mobi files for the ebook versions of your book.