Book Design & Publishing Support
A Collaborative Approach
Whether you’re an independent author, organization, or publisher, your book deserves thoughtful design, experienced guidance, and careful attention to production. Mayfly provides professional book design and publishing support tailored to your book project. Here’s what sets our collaborative approach apart.
Personalized Service
Every project includes direct collaboration with an experienced designer and dedicated project manager who get to know your goals, answer your questions, and guide your book from concept through production.
US-Based Team
Based in the thriving literary hub of Minneapolis, our experienced U.S.-based team takes pride in building lasting relationships with authors, organizations, and publishers through thoughtful communication and collaborative guidance.
Every book project presents its own creative, technical, and publishing considerations. Whether you’re an independent author, organization, or publisher, Mayfly provides personalized guidance and professional support from the earliest planning stages through final production.
Our services are designed to work together. From book cover design and page design to book typesetting, publishing support, and printer sourcing, we help create books that are thoughtfully designed, professionally produced, and prepared for publication. Throughout the process, you’ll work directly with a small, dedicated team that values collaboration, clear communication, and attention to detail.
Unlike traditional publishing, you retain ownership of your manuscript, publishing accounts, and publishing imprint while benefiting from experienced guidance tailored to your book and your publishing goals.
Custom Book Design Services
Every book project is designed from the ground up to meet your goals. Our book cover design, page design, and book typesetting services work together to create books that are visually engaging, professionally formatted, and ready for publication.
Cover Design Services
Create a memorable first impression with a professionally designed book cover that captures your book’s message and connects with your audience. Every cover is custom designed to reflect your content, genre, and publishing goals while meeting the technical requirements for print and digital publication.
Page Design Services
Thoughtful page design brings clarity, structure, and visual appeal to your book. We create professionally designed interiors that enhance readability, organize information effectively, and provide an engaging reading experience while meeting industry standards for print and digital publication.
Book Typesetting Services
Professional book typesetting ensures your manuscript is carefully formatted for clarity, consistency, and readability. We prepare print-ready files that meet industry standards while creating a polished reading experience and ensuring every page is ready for print and digital publication.
Showcase Book Projects
Some book projects require a higher level of customization, production expertise, and attention to detail. From art and coffee table books to memoir and legacy books, Mayfly helps clients create beautifully crafted books that combine professional book design, high-quality printing, and personalized publishing support.
Art and Coffee Table Books
Custom-designed art, photography, and coffee table books created with careful attention to design, production, material selection, and pairing your project with one of our trusted print partners.
Memoir and Legacy Books
Professionally designed memoirs, family histories, and anniversary books created to preserve meaningful stories, whether printed for family and friends or made available worldwide through Amazon KDP and IngramSpark.
Whether you’re publishing independently or on behalf of an organization, Mayfly provides experienced publishing support to help you navigate the technical details of bringing your book to market. From registration and platform setup to printer sourcing and production, we provide the guidance and technical support needed to prepare your book for publication.
Title Registration
We’ll help you obtain ISBNs through Bowker, register your title, and apply for a Library of Congress Control Number (LCCN), providing the publishing essentials needed to prepare your book for publication.
Print-on-Demand Setup
We’ll help prepare your files, metadata, and publishing accounts for Amazon KDP and IngramSpark while guiding you through the setup process, ensuring everything is ready for worldwide print-on-demand distribution.
Printer Sourcing
We’ll help identify and compare trusted print partners, production estimates, printing and binding options, materials, and quantities to find the best fit for your project’s goals and budget. Once a printer is selected, we’ll prepare the final files to their specifications and help guide the project into production.
Additional Services
In addition to our core book design and publishing support services, Mayfly offers a selection of complementary services to help prepare your book for publication and reach readers in additional formats.
eBook Formatting
Expand your book's reach with professionally formatted eBook files for Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, Kobo, and other major reading platforms. We prepare validated eBook files that provide a consistent reading experience across supported devices.
Editorial Services
A professionally proofread manuscript provides the best foundation for book design and production. Before typesetting begins, we encourage authors to have their manuscript reviewed by a qualified proofreader to identify spelling, grammar, punctuation, and consistency issues.
Consultation
Need guidance before starting your book project? Whether you have questions about book design, self-publishing, printer selection, or publishing platforms, professional consultations are available for $150 per hour. Questions related to active or upcoming Mayfly projects are always complimentary.
Customer Reviews
Although I’d worked for many years as a publisher in New York City for a global publishing firm, and, earlier, in stints as a magazine editor in the South, and a journalist in the Midwest, I’d never had time to pursue my own work properly, as a writer of literary nonfiction and fiction. Recently, I researched how I might do this now, to bring several of my booklength manuscripts to life. Imagine my deep joy in finding Mayfly! They are matchless professionals in art, design, and production, with comprehensive publishing acumen. More than that, Julie, Ryan, and Jess are wonderfully kind, communicative, efficient, and caring, people to work with. I’m button-popping proud of my first book of literary stories, just published under Mayfly’s umbrella. There will be more!
—Michael Carman, Hudson River Press, author of The Wall in the Head
After hearing great reviews about Mayfly, I chose them to handle all aspects of my non-fiction title… and the final results were wonderful. Throughout the process, they were exacting in every way. No detail was ever too small. It was so reassuring to be working with such a professional group. Also, they did some incredible photoshop work to improve dozens of text photos which I never thought was possible. Now that my paperback and ebook versions are successfully published, I couldn’t be more pleased with Mayfly. They did such a great job.
—Michael Prestigiacomo, author of My Best Friend Ralph
Mayfly was a dream to work with and you can see their amazing talent all throughout this book. They took a basic manuscript and a folder of photos and turned it into something spectacular!
—Ken Yagen, Bravo Zulu
Ryan and his team offer a serious, disciplined, and both professional and informal approach to launch not just books but any content, providing leads through their network of reputable vendors and partners. Ryan’s creative and measured work should instruct others to just give him your ideas and let him take the wheel so you can focus on the other pieces of your vision (which he gets). He will meet you there on the final sprint with quality product for a win. Rinse and repeat.
—Christine Friesel, author of The Boys of Bath: The Civil War Diary of Pvt. Charles Brother, USMC
As a first-time author, I found Mayfly to be the perfect partner for designing my book and preparing it for publishing. They took the time to understand exactly what services I required and provided a clear and detailed work proposal, then led me through the Mayfly process, which was reliable, complete, and collaborative. By executing the process step-by-step, Mayfly gave me complete confidence that every single detail was being managed correctly. The service was superbly professional and top-notch in every way, and my project was completed on time and within budget. I could not be more delighted with the final result!
—Elizabeth Parker, author of An Introduction to The Infinite Way Message of Joel S. Goldsmith
Experienced and creative design professionals. Great people, easy to work with. Detail-oriented. First-rate communication. Impressive technical expertise. Outstanding ideas, suggestions, and product. No need to go anywhere else, I’ve found a design home for my books. Highly recommended. Thank you, Jess, Julie, and Ryan.
—Marc Mayfield, author of Sam And Other Dogs