I spent this morning preparing and imposing three blocks, proofing and adjusting for evenness of printing surface, depth of ink and so on and, finally, printing a sheet from the actual edition. This is the fifth time that this sheet has gone through the press so I was keen that everything should go well.

My usual behaviour after reaching this point is simply to put a nice opera on the CD player and bash on with printing the whole edition. On this occasion I was so thrilled I thought I must get it on the Blog. Here, therefore, is the title spread, the spread with the Singer’s Prologue to the play and a close-up of one of the ‘selkie’ blocks that take up pages before and after the play itself. On each occasion the image is by Michael Onken – soon to make a short trip from the US to his beloved Orkney, not least so that he can sign the copies in the UK!

I have a lot still to do but now the excitement mounts to see the finished book.

Just for the moment, though, I must haul myself down from this high and settle down to print the remaining 200+ sheets of this particular printing!