The Anatomy of a Book

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The Anatomy of a Book

Even simple books consist of a sometimes intimidating set of moving parts.  To move from aspiring author to published author, or from published author to profitable author, is easier if you understand what those parts are how they work together. Understanding the anatomy of a book can even help you write the book more quickly, as it lets you outline the work and give you inspiration for additional material and resources.

In most cases, a book’s anatomy consists of three broad sections, each subdivided into smaller components.  These three broad sections are:

  • Front Matter: the material that comes before the main body of the book.
  • Body: the core contents of the book
  • Back Matter: the material after the main part of the book.

Let's look at each of these three sections in detail.

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