What is with the typeface of current books?

[Ian Keldon]

I've noticed that the font used inside the more recent Trek novels seems to be "thinner" and "lighter" than the older ones, not to mention being a slightly smaller "pitch". I would assume this is some sort of cost-saving measure on the part of the publisher.

Thing is, it's harder for people like me (with less than perfect vision) to read.

 

[Reanok]

I've had that problem with reading the newer books the typefont is hard to read when it's so small it takes forever to finish reading the longer length books.I'm glad some of the recent TOS novels have been using larger print.It makes it alot easier to read the last 2 novels I recently finished.

 

[T'Ressa Dax]

Noticed that years ago. Which is part of why I finally gave in and got my Kindle... Haven't bought a print Star Trek book since Zero Sum Game.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Ironically, I've been liking the current typeface in recent Trek books. It looks kinda like Garamond to me.

 

[Enterprise is Great]

The last few novels have looked fine to me.

 

[Sho]

That's one of the benefits of e-reading to me. Provided your device has a screen that compares well to print quality-wise and the device is flexible (or hackable) enough to accept custom fonts, you can read in any font family and font weight you want. I usually read TrekLit in Linden Hill, but when I read e.g. a Victorian novel I often pick something contemporary to add to the feeling.

 

[JD]

I only know how use the standard options of my Nook, but even those give at least three or four different font options and four or five different sizes to choose from. That's one of the other reasons I've found that prefer e-books to paperbacks, I have to ability to change the text to how want it, instead of just the one or two options the publisher gives me.

 

[beamMe]

That's one of the benefits of e-reading to me. Provided your device has a screen that compares well to print quality-wise and the device is flexible (or hackable) enough to accept custom fonts, you can read in any font family and font weight you want. I usually read TrekLit in Linden Hill, but when I read e.g. a Victorian novel I often pick something contemporary to add to the feeling.

I use the Sansation font for most of my SciFi-eBooks.

 

[Sho]

I prefer serif fonts for long-form reading.

 

[beamMe]

I prefer serif fonts for long-form reading.

I like the clarity of the sans-serif font.
But I rough-sub-categorize my ebooks into SciFi, Fantasy and Everything Else and use different fonts for each group:

for SciFi: Sansation
for Fantasy: Goodfish
and for Everything Else: Liberation Serif

 

[RandyS]

Ironically, I've been liking the current typeface in recent Trek books. It looks kinda like Garamond to me.

So do I. If anything, it's bigger than on the older books, which I also enjoyed. The thing that used to bother me was when a longer book, such as, either book one or two (I don't remember which) of MISSION: GAMMA was published, Pocket would use a smaller typeface, which made it harder for me to read. Not impossible, but it definately took me longer.

 

[Therin of Andor]

The thing that used to bother me was when a longer book, such as, either book one or two (I don't remember which) of MISSION: GAMMA was published, Pocket would use a smaller typeface, which made it harder for me to read.

As Marco explained at the time, that first MG novel was so long, the word count was about 2.5 times longer than the traditional length of a ST novel. To make the font any bigger would have blown out the cost.

We got real bargains on MG #1 and 2 and the three "World of DS9" two-in-one volumes.

My mistake in buying more books (not just ST) every month than I could ever manage to read is that my eagerly-awaited retirement investment is going to be illegible to my weakening eyes by the time I do retire. I now find that MMPB novels with small font tend to put me to sleep, and I can't read them in certain favourite positions (ie. gravity seems to pull on my lenses?).

Had I not been such an avid collector these past few decades, I coulda just bought an eDevice and made everything into "big print", like my grandfather did the old-fashioned way in his retirement, ie. He used to boast that he'd read everything on offer in his local library. Twice.

I recently completed a writing course in submitting picture book manuscripts and the professional editor who did the presentations each week said her various employers only accepted manuscripts in Times (12 point). Anything other than that slowed down her reading process - a lot - and would be set aside. She said it was amazing how many people thought that sending manuscripts in all manner of wacky fonts (the future choice of the book designer) would be helpful in getting their slushpile manuscript assessed efficiently.

 

[Christopher]

My mistake in buying more books (not just ST) every month than I could ever manage to read is that my eagerly-awaited retirement investment is going to be illegible to my weakening eyes by the time I do retire.

Invest in a book magnifier. They have lenses you can put over a book to magnify a whole page at a time.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Invest in a book magnifier. They have lenses you can put over a book to magnify a whole page at a time.

Already have one. It is the size of an A4 page; two freebies are the size of credit cards. Being transparent, I keep losing them around the house!

But the magnifiers also make everything "swim" if you don't hold them still. I'm thinking I'll have to admit defeat and submit to laser surgery; I've been told I fit into the correct category to have it done.

 

[starrchild]

I found Droid Serif to be a good, easy-to-read font for e-ink e-readers, and thank goodness for that. I was having a *terrible* time reading my e-books in the installed default font my Sony reader had.

 

[beamMe]

I found Droid Serif to be a good, easy-to-read font for e-ink e-readers, and thank goodness for that. I was having a *terrible* time reading my e-books in the installed default font my Sony reader had.

A rather steep price to pay.

 

[Sho]

The Droid font family is actually completely free; it's the font family that the open source Android mobile device operating system used to use by default (until they switched to Roboto in Android 4.0). Only "Droid Pro" costs money, which adds additional characters and weights I guess.

 

[starrchild]

The Droid font family is actually completely free; it's the font family that the open source Android mobile device operating system used to use by default (until they switched to Roboto in Android 4.0). Only "Droid Pro" costs money, which adds additional characters and weights I guess.

Yep, that's what I did, got the free version; sorry, I just linked to a site which had clear samples of that font.

 

[Sci]

BTW, does anyone happen to know the name of the typefaces used in The Buried Age and in Destiny? (I can't tell if they're separate or the same typefaces, but I rather like them.)

 

[C.E. Evans]

BTW, does anyone happen to know the name of the typefaces used in The Buried Age and in Destiny? (I can't tell if they're separate or the same typefaces, but I rather like them.)

To me, it seemed like URW Latino.
http://www.identifont.com/samples/urw/Latino.gif