| Formatting Example |
| BOOK TITLE/AUTHOR NAME 1 This is what a standard-formatted manuscript page will look like when you have your margins set for 1-1.25" and your line spacing set for double-spacing (I use Word Perfect 8.0, so for me, this is 1.8 line spacing) in a Courier 12 pt. font--I use Dark Courier, which shows up darker when printing. Remember to indent all new paragraphs and to indicate scene breaks either with three of these: * * * or with: # # # With this standard formatting set-up, you should get 25 lines on each page, which will help you arrive at the correct word count to calculate the length of your manuscript using the standard 250 words/page format. Also, when you begin a new chapter, you should begin either 1/3 or 1/2-way down a new page. Don't forget to underline any words, phrases or sentences you want to indicate should be italicized. Once you've created your standard format, you can save it as a template, to be used whenever you start a new manuscript. Each word processing program has its own instructions to do this. Formatting isn't that hard to do, and proper formatting makes your chances of being read by an editor increase--no editor wants to read a 400-page manuscript that is single- spaced. |
| For those who need a visual, here's an example of what your pages will look like in standard manuscript format. Pretty simple, really, to get your pages set up correctly, and worth every second. |
|