If you live outside Iran and want to print a book in Persian (your own memoir, a collection of your poems, a book for your grandchildren), finding a printer is not the hard part. Most online printers will print whatever file you send them. The trouble is in the file, and in a few things you only discover when the book arrives.
A Persian book opens from the right
Most online printers that print single copies bind every book on the left, because they were built for books in English. Send them a Persian file as it is and you get a book that opens from the left like an English one, which for a Persian reader means everything is backwards.
The fix is to reverse the page order of the print file and swap the front and back panels on the cover artwork. The printer then delivers a correct Persian book without knowing it has done so. The inside margins have to move as well, because in a right-to-left book the margin beside the spine is on the right of each odd page. If the book has an ISBN, ask where the barcode goes, because the printer puts it on what it thinks is the back cover.
Half-spaces and letters that fall apart
A file that looks right in Word or Google Docs can come apart when it is turned into a PDF. «میشود» turns into «می شود» or «میشود», letters stop joining, or the word order changes on any line that contains a number or an English word. Before you send anything, check the final PDF page by page, not just the Word file.
Put the Persian font inside the file
The printer does not have your Persian font. If the font is not embedded in the PDF, you may get empty boxes where the letters should be. Fonts such as Vazirmatn are free for anyone to use.
Make numbers and dates consistent
Decide whether numbers are Persian (۱۳۵۰) or Western (1350), and use one throughout the book. If your children and grandchildren grew up outside Iran, giving both the Persian and the Western date helps them.
Print one proof copy first
Before you order several copies, print one and hold it. A preview on the printer's website does not show which way the book opens or where the margins fall. Only a book in your hands shows that.
If the book is your own memoir
Moonray does not print files you upload. It prints a book made from a conversation with you. Moonray is an AI interviewer, and it says so in its first message. On WhatsApp or Telegram it asks you one question at a time, in Persian (Farsi) or English, and you answer by voice note or text whenever you like. Your memories are written in your own words, and the book is set in Vazirmatn, right to left, and printed to open from the right. You read every memory, and nothing prints until you say yes.
$149 gives you a year to tell your stories, a digital book and one full-colour printed hardcover, with shipping to most countries included. If your family reads English more easily, a printed English edition of the same book is $59, marked on the book as a translation. The first two weeks are free and need no card.