Adding and Removing Blank Pages

Welcome back to another tutorial designed to help you make the most of the formatting features available inside Atticus. 

In this brief post we’re going to learn how to add blank pages to both the body content and front matter of your book. 

There are a few ways you can insert blank pages into Atticus, depending on your need for that page. 

Begin on Right Side of Page

One of the most common reasons for adding a blank page is to have the first page of your chapter starting on the right side of the print version of your book. If the last page of a chapter finishes on the right side, you’ll need a blank page following it so that the next chapter also starts on the right side of the page. 

Atticus makes this super easy! If you click the three dots beside the title Body in the left navigation panel and choose Begin on > Right-side, it will automatically add a blank page at the end of any chapter that needs it, to force the next chapter to start on the right side of your book!

You can also do this for specific pages or chapters, if you prefer. Just click the three dots beside any title and choose Begin on > Right-side. Of course, you can also select Left-side or Either-side if that suits your book.

NOTE: The Begin on feature will not show for the first chapter or page in the body section of your book, because the first page will always begin on the right side, automatically.

Insert Blank Page Between or After Chapters

If you’d like to add a blank page for any other reason, such as a space for readers to add notes at the end of a chapter, for example, you can adjust the page level Chapter Heading settings to suit your needs. After adding a new chapter and positioning it where you’d like it to appear in your book, click the gear icon beneath the title to adjust the settings.

Within this menu, to ensure your page is completely blank you will want to:

• Hide Chapter Image
• Hide Chapter Heading

You may also choose to Hide Page Number and/or Header and Footer, depending on whether you’d like the page to have these details.

If you don’t want this blank page to show in your TOC, you can also select Hide in Table of Contents,

Even though you’ve hidden the Chapter Heading, it is always a good idea to give the page a title so you can easily identify it when you’re looking at your navigation panel quickly.

Remove Unexpected Blank Pages

If you have discovered that you have a blank page or pages in your book that were not put there on purpose, there are typically two reasons this may have occurred:

1. Your book is set to start new chapters on a specific side of the page, or
2. There are invisible trailing spaces at the end of a chapter, creating a blank page

The way you can tell the difference between these two issues is too look and see if the Print version has headers and footers on the page or not. If your blank page shows the book title, author name, chapter title or page number on the very top or bottom of the page, it is an issue with trailing spaces. If it’s completely blank, it’s caused by the Begin on feature. Here’s how to fix each situation:

Completely Blank Page(s) with No Header or Footer

If your book has completely blank pages showing up before a new chapter or chapters in your book, here’s how to fix it:

• Click the three dots beside the title Body in the left navigation panel
• Choose Begin on > Left side (to reset the programming)
• Click Begin on again and this time choose > Either side to get rid of all blank pages

If you continue to have trouble after this, you’re always welcome to email our support desk.

Header or Footer Showing on an Otherwise Blank Page

If at any time you export a PDF version of your book and you find a blank page following a chapter that has a visible header and footer, this is probably because you have some trailing spaces at the end of your chapter. In the chapter(s) before the blank page(s), can you go to the last sentence and press the down arrow a bunch of times. If there’s any invisible lines, the cursor will move. Once it’s as far as it’ll go, hit backspace until you get back to the last line of the paragraph.

If it’s easier, you can also try this:

• In the chapter/page before the extra pages, go to the very last line and place your cursor after the very last letter or character
• In the toolbar there is a Split Chapter button that looks like a little box being cut in half, press this
• If there are any invisible spaces at the end of your chapter, they’ll be pushed into a new chapter that looks blank, you can delete this and it will take with it any unwanted blank pages

Now you know how to add a blank page to the print version of your book, as well as remove blank pages that show up unexpectedly!