Enter your top, bottom, inside, and outside margins based on your books page count. Proper manuscript format for fiction writers william shunn. Too many writers worry more about formatting that they do the writing of their nonfiction book or novel manuscript. How complicated can it be to print out and duplicate a copy of a book proposal or. A manuscript is essentially the earliest draft of a book. How to format your manuscript even if you hate computers. Having some reallife examples at your side, you should get a better sense of. Before sending your book to print, you will need to layout the book.
There can be absolutely no printing outside these margin settings unless paying for bleed. Build your book format a paperback manuscript pages for. These inner margins are called gutter margins, based on the gutterlike shape they create in. The result can be that the manually hyphenated word appears on one line with a hyphen mark in the middle of the word. Here are the basics steps on formatting your manuscript in microsoft word for self publication. If you have comments or questions about manuscript formatting that are. Build your book format a paperback manuscript word for. Whether youre handling the technical aspects of this process yourself or having a service like bookbaby take care of it for you. The first has a little triangle on the left and is bigger more square like while the others i find are rectangular. Use a one inch margins on the top, bottom and sides. You can format your novel manuscript any way you want as youre writing and. It is the unpublished version of a book submitted to agents and editors for publication consideration.
And if all else fails, follow as many of the basics as you can. I have a problem i used a book manuscript format for my book and the first chapter uses a content control box but when i try and find the same one to use for chapter 2 i cant find the exact content control box. Margins ensure your text isnt cut off during manufacturing. Use twelve point times new roman in black type only. The problem is generally getting the line spacing and trim size the dimensions of the book right. How to format a manuscript the specifics guidelines you need. Basic book designmargins wikibooks, open books for an. Place the page numbers in the top righthand corner. Preparing your book proposal or manuscript for submission by marcia yudkin. Prepare, publish, promote prepare your book format your manuscript paperback submission overview build your book format a paperback manuscript word for windows build your book format a paperback manuscript word for windows. Download a free manuscript format template for your novel. Standard manuscript format is a formatting style for manuscripts of short stories, novels, poems and other literary works. But, any other web site or service and some can be tried for free will be able to translate your manuscript from word to pdf. Setting page size and margins a few key terms before you start.
Feedaread currently supports 5x8 inch books and also 6x9 inch books with more options coming soon. Formatting for the kindle is really plain formatting just like typing on a typewriter, if youre old enough to remember those days. Margins blank sections of a page that wrap around your printed content. Standard manuscript format news newspapers books scholar jstor november 2015. Set margins to at least 40mm on the left, 25mm top and bottom and about mm on the right. Create a cover page for your book manuscript with this accessible simple black and white template.
But a print manuscript is unlike any other word documentits margins are different on different sides. Editors see a gazillion manuscripts every day, and the sight of certain common errors makes them sigh with impatience. Most word docs have even margins on the left and right and also at the top and bottom. Changing the margins of your poetry many poems contain special formatting achieved by using spaces, tabs, and hard returns. Images in the margins of medieval manuscripts september 1november 8, 2009 at the getty center just outside the blocks of latin text and larger illustrations, the pages of medieval books often teem with tiny characters, creatures, and fantastic plantscollectively called marginalia. Manuscript templates as one of the top book publishing companies, we make book publishing easy.
As noted above with font choice, using equal margins is a rule to keep novices out of trouble. If the correct font size is used, and if the margins are set so that lines contain an average of 60 characters, the. After the title page, begin the manuscript halfway down and place your name and contact details in the top righthand corner. Writing a synopsis for your manuscript writing and. A novel manuscript requires a title page formatted in this manner click to see example contact. Set the margins for your document at 3cm on all four sides. This ultimate guide shows you how to format your book stepbystep. Before sending my fiction manuscript off to agents, i want to be sure i have it formatted correctly.
Use mirror margins with unequal inner and outer margins, if your document will be bound e. To do that, you have to know the trim size, the interior margins, the gutter or space between pages for binding, etc. In order to turn your book into a functional ebook, your manuscript document. Begin numbering with the first page of the text of the book, usually the introduction, prologue, or chapter one. Margins prevent your manuscript text from getting cut off on the edges.
You can upload your book manuscript file as either a word document, rtf document or pdf to publish. If all the above tips read like greek to you, get a young person to walk you through them. Manuscript format is a small, but important factor in the publishing process. Set your document size to the book size you plan on publishing, then include a top and bottom margin of. Yes, sure, agents are looking for wonderful writing above all, so in that sense the way you format your manuscript is secondary. The editor also provides four popular trim sizes for formatting 4. This is the default for most word processors, but you might want to recheck your settings just to be safe. Every page has three outside margins top, bottom, and side and one inside margin also called the gutter. Marginalia or apostils are marks made in the margins of a book or other document.
Youve written a book, and now you need to figure out the manuscript format. Luckily for you, formatting your manuscript can be summarized in a few bullet points. Also, will the margins for an ebook and a printed one differ. Download your free book outline template and leverage this fillintheblank template. Start formatting by deciding on three major issues. The stepbystep guide to formatting your print book for kdp. To send in for a critique by the wd staff they will request that you use 1 12 in margins, which is different than the standard formatting of 1 in. When the text is imported into our publishing software margins may change causing text to shift. Even with the advent of desktop publishing, making it possible for anyone to prepare text that appears professionally typeset, many publishers still require authors to submit manuscripts within their respective guidelines although there is no single set of guidelines. All books must be formatted within the margins required for the book trim size of your choice. You should never manually hyphenate words in your manuscript. Margins are the white space that surrounds text on a page, including headers and footers, as well as the gutter space for the books spine. Build your book format a paperback manuscript pages for mac in this stepbystep guide, we show you how to format a paperback manuscript in pages version 7. At diggypod, we offer free book templates for the author wanting to publish a book.
Book manuscript format templates interior book design. At the time, all novel manuscripts or other written works were handwritten. Set oneinch margins all aroundleft, right, top, and bottom. The margins are different because the margin closest to the binding of the book the inner margins must to be larger than the outer so that the text doesnt get cut off from being too close to the binding. The term manuscript has its origins in the latin term manu scriptus, which means written by hand. Our printing and binding process requires minimum margin settings of. If you understand traditional book design dont follow this rule. Again, margins arent something we need to worry about when formatting for kindle, but theyre crucial for print. Typically, the more pages in a book, the wider the margins need to be, especially the inner margin between facing pages.
Formatting a manuscript for a print book isnt hard, but youll want to take advantage of the expertise of book designers. Walk through setting up page size and margins based on your trim size and page count. The directions below are for ms word 7 and 10 the most. I found some who recommended the same margins top and bottom but others who recommended larger bottom margins and still others who suggested going with larger top margins. By colin dunbar in todays self publishing world, its a good idea to have your book available in as many formats as you can. Preparing your book proposal or manuscript for submission. In book publishing, agents and editors will often refer to books in manuscript form, noting that the book is in the earliest stages of preparation. These steps include including setting up the correct trim size, setting up the correct margins, formatting the text, and numbering the pages.
If you dont make a good first impression, your childrens book manuscript will likely get sent right back to you accompanied by one of those dreaded rejection letters. Standard manuscript format is a formatting style for manuscripts of short stories, novels, poems. Use black type only, since other colors can make your work difficult to. Have you had lots of questions over the years about words mirrored margins. Archway publishing will lay out your manuscript to fit the margins during the production process. Margins are the space around the edge of the page where there are no words. Today, a manuscript refers to a preliminary draft of a novel, short story, or nonfiction book. Cover templates are also available for the type of binding you select. They may be scribbles, comments, glosses annotations, critiques, doodles, or illuminations. There are many types of manuscripts, from works of fiction to scientific treatises, and even more places where you can submit a manuscript for consideration for publication.
How to format your book for self publication bookstand. How to format a novel manuscript writing academy scribophile. Manuscript preparation book sizes we offer four standard book sizes. Manuscript presentation makes a big difference to the way literary agents receive your work. How to format your childrens book manuscript dummies. Margins blank space on the inside edges nearest to the book binding that prevents your manuscript text from extending into the binding. You will need a template for the inside pages of the book, and a template for the outside cover of your book. How to format your novel manuscript the editors blog. Proper manuscript format for a novel first manuscript.
On july 25, 20, i closed this article to new comments because the volume of comments and their length was causing problems for the pages setup. Understanding book layouts and page margins joel, thanks a ton for all of your info. A few of you have asked for information about writing a synopsis for your manuscript. How many pages would my manuscript be in paperback. We have clearly marked the page size with templates for each size of book. This video is specific to paperback books with no bleed. The client has told me that the book should be formatted to be 6x9, but ive looked around different forums and it seems that everyone has their own preferred marginsis there no industry standard. After you select the size of book you want to publish, it is recommended that you print a copy of the template for the book size. Once again youll want to investigate what book designers have to say. How do i format my manuscript to the industry standard.