Back during the summer of 2007 I ran a piece in my still-young, original blog. “Four (Sometimes Multi-Part) Questions for Book Designers. Now that I have a website and a blog again I’m reposting my old blog pieces so that what I’ve had to say on book design and freelancing is complete.

And so I came to a piece in my still-young, original blog, “Four (Sometimes Multi-Part) Questions for Book Designers.” That was always one of my favorite pieces. So much so, that I repeated it a few times over the years when that blog was up and kicking.

The questions happened to be of interest to me personally and ones that I thought beginners might do well to ponder. I still feel that way; so I’m asking those questions, updated a tad, here and now. I invite anyone reading this to answer in the Comments. I’m really interested in

First of all, what’s the first aspect of designing a book that comes to mind once you have an agreement on a book design project and sit down to start work?

Second, did InDesign wind up being the Quark killer for you; and, if so, was there one feature that did it for you; or do your clients determine the software you use. More up-to-the-minute, is the Affinity suite—Publish, Design, and Photo—the InDesign/Adobe Creative Studio killer for you?

Next, what’s the first typeface comes to mind each time you begin a book design project; do you usually stick with that first choice or say something like, “Yes, I really like that font, but it’s time I work with something else”?

Finally, name one book about design that you highly recommend to other book designers.

After all the times I’ve posed these questions I’m still interested as all get-out to know what you think.