How Much Time to Read a Page of 12 Point Font Single Spaced

Earlier an Acquisitions Editor or an Agent reads a word of your manuscript, they tin tell if it's properly formatted.

That's crucial. Why?

It'south about more than than looks. Sure, they're going to decide on buying your work largely on the writing and marketplace potential.

So why is formatting so important?

• Whatever errors will accept to exist fixed before printing — which adds costs on their stop.
• Poor formatting indicates that either you didn't read their submission guidelines or can't follow directions.

Proper formatting doesn't guarantee publication, nor does poor formatting guarantee rejection. Simply you've worked difficult on your manuscript. You want to requite it the all-time chance to become a book.

This guide offers you:

• • Formatting guidelines to ensure your manuscript looks professional
  • Simple instructions to formatting in Microsoft Word.
  • An example from my ain writing

Need help writing your book? Click here to download my ultimate xx-pace guide.

Getting Started: What is a Manuscript?

A manuscript is your work of fiction or nonfiction that you lot submit to a publisher or amanuensis in the hope that someone will plough it into a published book.

What is Formatting?

Formatting is how your manuscript looks. This includes things like whether the lines are single- or double-spaced. What size font? What typeface? How are numbers rendered — as digits or written out?

Manuscript Formatting Guidelines

Each amanuensis and publisher may accept slightly unlike submission guidelines — some specifying that they prefer The Chicago Transmission of Style or the AP (Associated Printing) Style, and some offer style specifics of their ain.

If you're submitting to one who specifies, naturally yous desire to give them what they want.

Simply some don't give instructions across "standard manuscript format." And so your best bet is to make your ain choices, just exist certain yous're consistent.

For instance, if you write out numbers between zero and nine and utilise digits for any after that, exercise it the same manner every time. If they wanted to modify them, they can do information technology easily.

As for how to layout your manuscript pages and decide their look, post-obit sure general rules will make your manuscript look professional. For more than particular, refer to the "Implementing Formatting" section.

1. Use 12-signal type
2. Use a serif font; the most common option is Times Roman
3. Double space your manuscript
4. No extra space betwixt paragraphs
5. Only one infinite betwixt sentences
6. Indent each paragraph half an inch (setting a tab, not using several spaces)
7. Text should exist flush left and ragged right, not justified
8. If you cull to add a line between paragraphs to point a change of location or passage of time, center a typographical dingbat (similar ***) on the line
9. Black text on a white background only
10. I-inch margins (the default in Give-and-take)
11. Create a header with the title followed by your last proper noun and the page number. The header should appear on each page after the championship folio.

Additionally, agents and publishers want your name, email, address, and phone number in the top left and word count to the nearest hundred in the acme correct of your title folio. Your title should be nigh a third of the the page from the top and centered. It should be the same size and font as the balance of the text. Don't make it assuming, italic, or larger.

Implementing the Format

Here's more than detail on each of these rules to aid you lot understand how to format your manuscript in Microsoft Give-and-take.

Use 12-Point Type:

Twelve-point is the size of the text (messages an inch loftier would be 72-point blazon). Make sure your formatting is set to 12 by clicking this push button in Word.

To format your document all at once, printing and agree Ctrl and press A to select the whole document, then use the font change box to change all the text. You can apply this same procedure to any editorial modify you wish to make in an entire file at a fourth dimension.

Use a Serif Font:

Fonts are the various designs of typefaces. Serifs are those small projects that finish off a letter, every bit in Times Roman type. Cull Times New Roman, and you can't go wrong. Hither's how to change your font, if necessary, using the same procedure we used to change the type size:

Double Space Your Manuscript:

This means your manuscript volition a space between lines, like this:

This is an example of double spacing, every bit opposed to the single spacing of the rest of this blog post. You do not want to achieve this by striking Enter at the end of each line. That will event in such garbled formatting that information technology's an almost automatic rejection. Set your give-and-take processor to double space using this button:

No Extra Space Between Paragraphs:

Notice the extra space between the paragraphs of this blog post? Manuscripts shouldn't take those considering published books customarily don't. (And if they do, it'southward an indication the book was self-published.). Unfortunately, Discussion is often defaulted to adding .8 points extra betwixt paragraphs, so you lot'll want to modify that this way (and brand it your default):

Only One Space Betwixt Sentences:

Those of us who learned to type on typewriters were taught to striking the space bar twice between sentences, and it'due south a hard habit to suspension. But you never encounter more 1 infinite between sentences in published books.

And then if yous've already written your manuscript with ii spaces between sentences, don't despair. In that location'south a shortcut to fixing this in Microsoft Word.

First, click Supervene upon.

You should see a box labeled "Find and Supplant." In the outset box, type two spaces. In the second box type ane space. This tells the word processor, "Wherever you lot see ii spaces together, alter that to i space."

Finally, click "Supersede All."

Indent Each Paragraph Half an Inch:

Choose this selection in the menu shown here, not by striking the space bar several times at the outset of each paragraph. This manner your new paragraphs are automatically indented when yous hit Enter at the end of the previous i.

Text Should Ragged Right, not Justified:

Ragged Right ways your text doesn't line up perfectly against the right side of the page the way information technology does on the left. In a published book, text is often Justified, only that's after editing and proofreading and final formatting. For your manuscript, any copy that you don't want centered (like affiliate titles) should be Flush Left and Ragged Right.

Your text should wait like this:

Not similar this:

Discover that the second paragraph adds space between the words to make the lines yet length. Click hither to make your text ragged right.

I Inch Margins:

Your margins are the white infinite at the tops and bottoms and sides of the page where in that location is no text. They should be one inch past default.

If you need to adapt them in Microsoft Word, simply click on Layout, then Margins, and choose the first selection, Normal.

Creating a Header:

A header is text that appears above each page before the showtime line. For your manuscript it should show your last proper noun at the left, the book title centered, and the page number to the right.

Do not include a header on the title page.

To create a header in Microsoft Word, motion your cursor into the margin above the top line and click twice. A new tab should appear at the top that reads "Header and Footer Tools." Within that, click the button labeled "Folio Number." You'll run into a drib-down carte that allows yous to place the page number on the right.

To keep your header from actualization on the first page, press "Dissimilar Get-go Folio" nether the "Header and Footer Tools" tab.

Example from My Own Writing

Here's the title page of the manuscript of my new novel, Dead Ocean Rise, that I submitted to my publisher. Yours should look something like this:

Don't Fret

Too many writers worry more about formatting that they do the writing of their nonfiction volume or novel manuscript.

If all the above tips read like Greek to you, get a young person to walk you through them. And if all else fails, follow equally many of the nuts as y'all can. The crucial ones are san serif typeface and 12 pt. size, Ragged Correct, double spaced lines, one infinite between sentences, and indented paragraphs.

Most of import to an Agent or an Acquisitions Editor is whether you have something to say, can write it engagingly, and tell a story (fiction or nonfiction).

Need assistance writing your book? Click here to download my ultimate xx-step guide.

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Source: https://jerryjenkins.com/manuscript-format/

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