Smashwords has a wonderful free ebook, Style Guide by Mark Coker on, click here. you guessed it, styling your manuscript. I recommend you read it before you type one word of your MS. It's absolutely a must if you want to avoid a huge formatting mess at the end. You really can conquer Microsoft word. This book is written in complete and understandable detail. It can be used for any form of general formatting for submission to anyone, anywhere. You may have to tweak a bit depending on submission requirements, but only a bit.
For those of you who are struggling with editing your WIP, I have a suggestion that works, and you don't have to spend a cent. When you begin your proofreading, resize your MS to book size, such as 5.5 x 8.5. Go into edit, page setup and click on the paper tab. I swear it's as affective as pointing your toes to keep your leg straight. (how many of you just tried that?) Reading in this manner will turn you from writer to reader and those errors will fly off the page. Try it and let me know how well it works.
On that subject, I'm almost done with my proofing. It's taken a long time and a lot of work and a lot of cutting, but, as a result, I have a good book, so it's worth it. I'm hoping to get it published before Christmas, but if I don't, soon after. Oh, I'll be so glad to put this one to bed.
You all have wonderful weekends and God bless.
Great suggestion....will do that for sure. I must have an older version of Word than you. I just went to the view tab and chose Reading Layout. I'll be using it as soon as I get back my ms from my editor.
ReplyDeleteThanks
I've never heard of that suggestion before (resizing the ms to book size). What a great idea. Once I start revisions, I'll have to give that a try.
ReplyDeleteAnd good luck with the Christmas goal. I've got my fingers crossed for you!
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ReplyDeleteOnce upon a time I was trying to figure out how many pages (standard paperback size) my current WIP would run and I couldn't find a word-to-page conversion formula, so I measured a book and re-formatted my page in Word.
ReplyDeleteBut I like your idea of using this as an editing tool. Thanks for the good suggestion.
Great post, Elizabeth. Thanks for sharing this. I'm going to hop right over to try the eBook. Thank you also for that.
ReplyDeleteI came by, just to say hello and see how you’re doing. I hope you have a splendid Weekend!
Thank you so much for such a useful tip!
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