In June, Miles Kelly Publishing was featured in the Bookseller’s article “IBooks Author uptake defies expectations”, and I wanted to continue with that subject post our first iBook Discovery Channel™: Speed Machines going live.

Books made with iBooks Author are still in their early stage, that’s plain to see when you look on the iBookstore – this area is largely populated by titles from Dorling Kindersley. One reason for this might be that iBooks Author was initially designed with textbooks in mind, and the UK textbook side is nowhere to be seen, unlike in the US. Having said that, for Miles Kelly Publishing, it was a no-brainer to enter the world of iBooks Author, after all this is an age where interactivity and digital publishing is advancing at a rate of knots. Only yesterday I read an article that eBooks accounted for 15% of US Trade Publishers revenues - a massive $2 billion – how could we not get involved? Even more so, with every published sales report showing the meteoric rise of eBooks and how children’s digital publishing is not quite following this trend, it’s likely that most children’s publishers, and certainly children’s reference publishers, are constantly searching for that hook to initiate their own big spike in eBook sales.

From my experience, the problem with children’s books and how they cross over into the digital sphere revolves around interactivity. There are parts of children’s publishing that have done well, namely teen fiction, which has seen a similar rise to adult fiction. The rest has not been quite so meteoric. This is where iBooks Author hopes to bridge some of the gap. Yes, children’s publishers could spend thousands of pounds creating interactive Apps that enthrall and mesmerize children with their content (a massive nod to Nosy Crow here who have done this tremendously well) but what about the rest of us who cannot afford such huge budgets? More importantly, if you are like Miles Kelly Publishing, what about those children’s publishers who produce mainly reference material – how do you make that kind of material approachable to an iPad generation where everyone is vying for their time?

Miles Kelly was an early adopter of eBooks for children, starting in 2010 with traditional titles such as Children’s Classic Stories, which has proved to be a consistent seller. To date, we have over 140 eBook titles in a mix of traditional and fixed layout formats. This has given us an opening to various Apple iBookstores. iBooks Author gave us the chance to take a successful series we produce in conjunction with the Discovery Channel™ and move it up to the next level. By no means was it an easy process; redesigning the book to work in iBooks Author caused our designers some serious headaches. Adding interactivity such as slideshows, videos and 3D models whilst painstakingly making sure they didn’t end up looking like boring bolt-ons to the original book constantly stretched our schedule. We had hoped for the book to be out at the beginning of June, but this then moved to the end of June. However our perseverance paid off, and the book looks fantastic. We were able to work quite closely with Apple on this project, gaining valuable feedback on what could enhance the book.

It is clear that iBooks Author is an important new area for Apple and they would like publishers to adopt the tool wherever possible. Our early experience with iBooks Author, especially in the UK, has given us the chance to test out what we could do design wise and technically. We were able to send early prototypes of Speed Machines to Apple for feedback. It wasn’t always the easiest of processes and Apple’s input was mostly from a technical point of view. The end product however, showcases what you can do with iBooks Author on a relatively small budget. Currently, many iBooks are either very simple in design or do not utilize the interactive functions as much as they could. When creating Speed Machines we wanted to make sure that it had the Miles Kelly design stamp, no matter how tricky that would be. We have also been fortunate in that being early adopters in the children’s section, we have been able to discuss and work with Apple on how best to promote Speed Machines, and also when future titles are released.

It’s early days for Speed Machines, creation was just step one – the biggest step now is encouraging customers to download it. We had our soft launch at the beginning of July, with more to come in August. Miles Kelly Publishing has had to learn fast with eBooks. As a small company we are in a fantastic position to grow in the digital sector, but also run it in parallel with our print sector. We believe in iBooks Author and the product it gives us at a cost effective price, so much so that our Inside series of books will be extended to four multi-touch titles coming out in late August, as well as other series due out later in the year.

Discovery Channel™: Speed Machines is available now on the iBookstore for just £2.99 in the UK or $1.99 in the USA.