A design here is not a colour scheme. It is a complete set of typographic decisions: which face, at what size, with how much leading, how a chapter opens, what marks a scene change, what runs along the top of the page. The sort of thing a book designer settles once and then applies to three hundred pages without thinking about again.
Every typeface below is under the SIL Open Font License, which permits embedding in a book you sell. You can change the size, the leading and the indent afterwards; the design only sets where they start.
The safe default. What a paperback looks like when nobody is showing off.
A sixteenth-century face, a drop cap, and a lot of air. Literary fiction.
High contrast, high x-height, easy at small sizes. Built for 5 × 8.
Warm, contemporary, slightly informal. Reads like a voice.
Light on the page, wide leading, room to breathe. Poetry and short forms.
Calligraphic, slightly irregular, designed for very long reading.
Sans headings, serif text, numbered chapters. Non-fiction with structure.
Sans throughout, tight and functional. Workbooks and reference.
Not sure which?
Take Trade. It is the one that will never be the reason a reader notices the typesetting, which is what a trade paperback design is for. Fiction that wants a voice on the page is better served by Garamond; non-fiction with subheadings and lists by Manual.
Try them on your own book →