--- title: "Front and back matter checklist — the order it goes in" description: "Every page that goes before and after the story, in the order it goes in, for a print or an ebook edition. Tick your way through it." source: https://usegalley.com/resources/front-and-back-matter-checklist --- [Home](https://usegalley.com/) [Resources](https://usegalley.com/resources) Front and back matter # Front and back matter checklist Everything that goes before and after the story, in the order it goes in. Print and ebook want different things, so pick the edition and the list changes. Edition Show Ticked 0 of 0 ### Front matter - Half title The title alone on a right hand page. Print convention, and the first page a reader sees. - Also by this author, if you have one Facing the title page. Skip it on a debut. - Title page Title, subtitle, author, imprint. Always a right hand page. - Copyright page On the back of the title page. Copyright line, edition, ISBN, printer, the fiction disclaimer, and credits for anything quoted. - Dedication, if you have one Right hand page, no heading, short. - Epigraph, if you have one A quotation before the story. If it is still in copyright you need written permission, and you need it before you print. - Contents Required in an ebook and it must be linked. Optional in a novel in print, and often left out when chapters are only numbered. - Map or family tree, if you have one Before the story rather than after it, because the reader needs it from page one. - A note on the text, if you have one Language, dialect, historical liberties. Keep it under a page. - Prologue, if you have one Part of the story, so it is numbered with the story, not with the front matter. ### The story ### Back matter - Epilogue, if you have one Still the story. Set it like a chapter. - Acknowledgements The back is the right place in fiction. Non-fiction puts them in the front. - About the author Third person, short, with one way to find you. The last page most readers reach. - Also by this author, if you have one With series order spelled out. This is the page that sells the next book. - An extract from the next book, if you have one The single most effective thing in the back of a novel. - Newsletter or mailing list, if you have one Ebook only in practice. A print reader will not type a URL. - Reading group questions, if you have one Book clubs are how literary fiction spreads. - Glossary or cast list, if you have one For translated terms, invented languages, or a large cast across a series. - A request for a review, if you have one One sentence. Do not name a retailer you are not exclusive to. - Colophon, if you have one The typeface, the printer, the paper. Old fashioned, and readers who notice it are the ones who care. This runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you type is sent anywhere, and there is no account to make. ## What goes where, and why Two rules cover almost every decision on this list. Anything the reader needs in order to read the book goes in front of the story. Anything about the book goes behind it. **In print** the front matter obeys the spread. Half title, title page and dedication all sit on a right hand page, and the copyright page sits on the back of the title page because that is the one place it has always been. Front matter is numbered in lower case roman numerals, or not numbered at all, and the arabic numbering starts at the first page of the story. Padding to a right hand page is why your final page count moves in twos. **In an ebook** none of that applies. There are no spreads and no blanks, the contents has to be a real linked table, and the sample a reader sees on the store starts at the beginning of the file. Every page of front matter is a page of your sample spent on something that is not your first line. Galley builds the matter pages with the book rather than beside it, and generates the copyright page from the edition's own metadata, so the ISBN on it is the ISBN of the format you are exporting. More in [structure](https://usegalley.com/docs/structure) and [publishing](https://usegalley.com/docs/publishing). **For working things out, not for signing anything.** Printers and retailers set their own rates and specifications, change them without notice, and none of them is affiliated with me or with Galley. I last checked this page in August 2026. Confirm on the official page before you commit money to a price, a print run or a contract. ## Questions What order does front matter go in? Half title, then the title page, then the copyright page on its back, then dedication, epigraph and contents. The story starts after that. Anything the reader needs in order to read the book, like a map, goes before the story. Anything about the book goes after it. What has to be on a copyright page? The copyright notice with your name and the year, the edition and printing, the ISBN for that format, your imprint, and for a novel the disclaimer that it is a work of fiction. Add credits for any quoted lyric, poem or photograph, because that is where the permission you paid for gets acknowledged. Does an ebook need front matter? Less of it. There are no blank pages to fill and no right hand pages to respect, and Amazon’s Look Inside opens at the start of the file, so a reader who has to scroll through six pages of front matter may never reach your first line. Move the copyright page to the back if you can, and keep a linked contents. What is the difference between a prologue and a foreword? A prologue is part of the story and you wrote it. A foreword is about the book and somebody else wrote it. A preface is about the book and you wrote it. Novels almost never need the last two. ## Next [ISBN checkerThe number that goes on the copyright page.](https://usegalley.com/resources/isbn-checker) [Words to printed pagesMatter pages count towards the total.](https://usegalley.com/resources/word-count-to-page-count) [Amazon description formatterThe copy outside the book.](https://usegalley.com/resources/amazon-book-description-formatter) [Copyright page generatorThe one page on the list with fixed wording.](https://usegalley.com/resources/copyright-page-generator) More at [the resources index](https://usegalley.com/resources). Put all this into practice when you write your novel in Galley. [Launch Galley](https://app.usegalley.com)