In an earlier writing entitled “What Becomes A Book” on 14 May 2010 I suggested that after you have created several (as you define) chapters using the PDF format, you should combine the chapters into a book using (1) the expensive Acrobat Pro, or (2) borrowing a copy at Kinkos or a friend’s.
But once again Google has proven its worth.
I searched for “how to combine pdf files” and below are respective sites which came up for both the Mac and the PC.
It turns out that the PREVIEW software (standard on a Mac) allows one to add a page or pages to a starting document. You merely tell Preview to open the “Sidebar”, found on the top right of the screen and then drag the next document or chapter whereever you want it.
Thus, you might start with a Book Cover, add next a Table of Contents, add next an Author’s Summary. Now you might add the Chapter 1 Cover, and then an Overview of Surname 1 and follow that with Chapter 1. All followed with the balance of the chapters in the same format.
PC users may have a bit more work, but the effort can produce an excellent book, in color, with pictures or graphics as you wish. Duplicating the CD which you would burn creates a most inexpensive book of your Family History..
Here are various sites:
http://macintoshhowto.com/leopard/how-to-merge-pdf-files-with-preview-in-leopard.html
http://download.cnet.com/PDF-Combine/3000-18497_4-10429191.html $60
http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-merge-pdf-files-for-free/ (but with a size limit of 5MB)
http://www.a-pdf.com/merger/ $27
