ellen_datlow (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ellen_datlow) wrote2008-08-20 05:11 pm
ellen_datlow) wrote2008-08-20 05:11 pm
Entry tags:
A rant on proper manuscript formatting
Recent reading and editing has brought to my attention the fact that some writers have suddenly (well, since using computers and email) decided that the usual rules of mss preparation are no longer necessary.
Three examples:
1) I have received print submissions without PAGE NUMBERS (not often, but still, this should never happen).
2) I have increasingly been the recipient of manuscripts that don't underline words meant to be italicized in the story's final, printed form. The reason editors/copy editors/and whoever does the production on a mss need to see underlines is that some typefaces don't show italics very well, and even if they did--it's quicker to "see" underline than italics
3)I have been receiving mss without anything indicating space breaks. What happened to ###? I'm in the middle of reading a printout that seemed to be missing at least two pages because there were no transitions...When I checked the efile, lo and behold, the sentence breaks were in different places so I could actually see that there were supposed to be space breaks. Writers--new and pro--please please show your space breaks by putting in hash marks.
4) Paragraphing--before online publishing, paragraphing was shown by indenting margins...Guess what, folks? Most publishing (especially of books) is still print, which means that paragraphs are indented.
Rant over
Three examples:
1) I have received print submissions without PAGE NUMBERS (not often, but still, this should never happen).
2) I have increasingly been the recipient of manuscripts that don't underline words meant to be italicized in the story's final, printed form. The reason editors/copy editors/and whoever does the production on a mss need to see underlines is that some typefaces don't show italics very well, and even if they did--it's quicker to "see" underline than italics
3)I have been receiving mss without anything indicating space breaks. What happened to ###? I'm in the middle of reading a printout that seemed to be missing at least two pages because there were no transitions...When I checked the efile, lo and behold, the sentence breaks were in different places so I could actually see that there were supposed to be space breaks. Writers--new and pro--please please show your space breaks by putting in hash marks.
4) Paragraphing--before online publishing, paragraphing was shown by indenting margins...Guess what, folks? Most publishing (especially of books) is still print, which means that paragraphs are indented.
Rant over
no subject
the newly popular mac os writing tool Scrivener can output to LaTeX and RTF (secret: RTF is derived from TeX and is only a bit more abstruse, so there are lots of conversion tools), and I think there are a few other things which output to LaTeX, for just general run of the mill stuff. Anything that I write that I think is going to end up on paper I write in a way that I can get into LaTeX quick if I need to.
And like I said, there's a SF manuscript style that's easy as pie to use and pretty much guarantees to never incur the wrath of an editor, and I have a template with my name and info stuff all set up, so really even a really recalcitrant document doesn't take much more than a few minutes to wrestle into shape.