One
Print the ruler
At 100% or Actual size. Then check the calibration line — it must measure exactly 100 mm. If it does not, your printer scaled the page and every reading will be wrong.
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Most large print books
are not large print.
There is no standard. Nobody checks. Anyone can put the words on a cover, which is why a book can say large print and still have your residents squinting at it.
So here is a ruler. Print it, lay it on a page, measure a capital letter. It takes about a minute and it works on any book — including every one of mine.
One page. Print at 100%, not Fit to page.
Three steps.
Two
Measure a capital
On a printed page from the book you are testing. Bottom of the letter to the top. Use a capital, not a lowercase letter, and not a number.
Three
Compare
Against the three numbers below. Do this once with whatever is already on your shelf and you will never buy a disappointing one again.
What the numbers mean.
4.9 mm
20 point
What every Good Light Press word search is set at.
4.4 mm
18 point
The American Printing House for the Blind's floor for large print.
3.5 mm
14 point
Below this it is an ordinary book with a sticker on the cover.
Two other things worth checking.
Puzzles per page beats puzzle count
A book advertising three hundred puzzles crammed two to a spread is close to useless for anyone working on a lap or a tray. One puzzle to a page can be picked up for ten minutes and put down again without losing your place.
Measure the word list too
Publishers shrink the word list to save paper constantly. It is the single most common complaint I hear — the grid is readable and the list underneath it is not. Measure both.
Questions.
Why does a book need testing at all? Doesn't it say the point size?
Point size is a typographic measurement. It describes the block the letter historically sat on, not the letter itself, and different typefaces fill that block very differently. Two books can both honestly say 20 point and reach the page at visibly different sizes. The only number that matters is the one you can measure.
Is large print a regulated term?
No. There is no standard and no certification. Anyone can print the words on a cover. The American Printing House for the Blind publishes research-based guidelines that put the floor at 18 point, which is roughly 4.4 mm of capital height, but nothing obliges a publisher to follow them.
My printer scaled the page. Does that matter?
Yes, completely. A ruler printed at 94% measures everything wrong. Print at 100% or Actual size, never Fit to page, then check the calibration line at the top of the sheet — it has to be exactly 100 mm.
What else should I look at besides letter size?
Two things. Whether there is one puzzle to a page, because a book with two to a spread is close to useless on a lap or a tray. And whether the word list is set at the same size as the grid — publishers shrink the list to save paper constantly, and a readable grid with an unreadable list helps nobody.
While you have the ruler out
Ten puzzles to measure it against.
Ten large print word searches, one to a page, with the answers. They are not in any book I sell — I made them to go with this. Print as many copies as you like, for as many people as you like.
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If the book you measured did not pass
Mine are built to the numbers above.
Large print word searches and sudoku, one puzzle to a page, set at twenty point and measured off the printed page rather than quoted off a spec sheet. Every one has a complete answer key, and with a group licenseyou can run a copy for everybody in the room, as often as you need.