YouTube video by Julie Broad (Book Broad) advising authors how to format manuscript files so editors can work efficiently. Emphasizes simplicity and standardization (use Word, single-file manuscript, standard fonts, left-justified black text, consistent paragraph style, page breaks, styles for headings, title page) and explains why elaborate visual formatting should be deferred until design stage.
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Sometimes when an author comes to us with a finished first draft of a manuscript, we get some really beautiful and elaborately designed manuscripts submitted in Word. I feel really bad when I say eh, we're gonna strip that book baby down to her birthday suit so we can get editors to work. Fancy clothes don't work on a book draft that needs to head to the editors or even to a book formatter. So if you're wondering how to format your manuscripts to get the best edits on your book, then stick around because this video is for you. Hey there. I'm Julie the Book Broad, founder of a fabulous self publishing services team called Book Launchers. Formatting isn't really considered one of the most exciting parts of writing a book. Let's be honest, not many people get super pumped about margin sizes, page breaks, or paragraph alignments. I know I don't. But some authors are highly visual and and try to make their Word doc look like they want their final book to look like when it's in its first draft. And if you're fighting with Word to get images to stay in the place you want them to stay in, you're probably driving yourself crazy. So keep it clean, save yourself some time, and ensure your editor is set up for success and doesn't have to spend a bunch of time fixing your formatting before they can do their editing. Now, in case I need to put that another way, you want things to be as simple as possible for your editor because when they can do things efficiently and effectively, they're probably going to do a better job of editing your book, which will be a better product for your readers. So it's a win for you, a win for the editor, and a win for the readers. There aren't necessarily set in stone rules when it comes to formatting your manuscript for editing. In my mind, it's more of a don't do list than a to do list, but here are the tips. Number one File Type While there's a lot of different writing programs out there, Word wins for Editors Word's Track Changes feature is a powerhouse feature for high level editing, and it's also the most commonly used tool, so most editors are going to be very comfortable in it. Of course, Google Docs and iPages have similar features, but I've shared before how these software options create massive problems in layout, and Google Docs works for shorter documents, but it lags and gets clunky as it gets to larger files. IPage doesn't have that clunky problem, but there's a chance your editor won't have an Apple computer and they'll find themselves unable to open the file. So all around word is the winner. Number two make your manuscript one file. Maybe you wrote your book in chapters and created separate files for each chapter. Maybe you even think that's a good way to edit because the editor can work on chapter one while you're working on chapter two. Let me stop you right there. No, no, don't do that. Send your editor one file and watch the video at the end on avoiding draft confusion to understand why I'm screaming no. If you have every chapter in a file and you work with Book Launchers, we have a wonderful team of concierges who will pull it all together for you in one document before we send it to an editor. Your editor may not want to do that, so pull it all together before you send it to your editor or they will probably charge you a fee to do it. Number three Use a standard font. You don't need to get fancy. There's going to be plenty of time for getting fancy during the design of your cover and your interior. Your editor doesn't want an art project. They want readable text. Not sure what to use? Try the serif font Times New Roman, which is the most common print font, or the non serif font which is the most common web font. Arial 12 point type is a safe bet when it comes to size. It's easy on your eyes and on the editor's eyes. Number four Left justify your text. That means all your text is aligned with the left margin and the right hand side of the text is jagged, not aligned, which means you're avoiding fully justified where each line is the same length. For now, your book may be formatted that way when it's designed for publication, but we don't want that right now. We want an easy document for editing. Number five Color black font. Please keep the color for the comments and track changes. When your book goes to editing, it's possibly going to feel really overwhelming to look at all the colors in the track changes. So for now, keep your text black and the background of your document white. Now's not the time for color or fun. Now's the time to get a great draft of your book ready for design. Number six Paragraphs and spacing. Don't worry about it. You could double space your manuscript if you want. I personally don't, but you do need to decide how to space between paragraphs. There are two ways to format the classic style or the modern style. Classic style is usually for novel short stories and fiction. That's where you indent the beginning of a paragraph with no space between new paragraphs. The modern style tends to be used in nonfiction, which is kind of how I roll. It means there's no indent at the beginning of the paragraph, but there's a space between paragraphs. Either style works. Just don't mix and match in the same document. Or just hit return. Just do what I do. Keep it simple. Hit return at that space and then let the formatter make it look right when layout's complete. Number seven Speaking of spacing one space after a period, please. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, then you also probably don't know about Soup Nazi, the Big Fat Wallet, or the Close Talker from Seinfeld. You didn't have a Hotmail email address and you weren't taught typing on a typewriter. I'm trying to feel wise, not old. But let's face it, if you learn typing on an actual typewriter, you were taught to hit the space bar twice to add extra space after the period. You don't do that these days. Single space after your period. Number 8 use page break, not return 20 times to separate chapters. The Page Break feature inserts a new page into the document without inserting a ton of return spaces, which are called hard returns that your editor or the layout person will have to delete. Oh, that reminds me, do you want to make sure to return to this channel and catch all the new videos? Then make sure to click subscribe and hit that notification bell so you're always notified when a new video comes out. Number nine Style with the style function, not bigger fonts. If you want to add multiple headings that include your chapter title, chapter number, or something else, then use the style function to format your headings rather than doing it manually. The good news is that this actually translates into your layout when you have your formatter get to work. Number 10 make a title page. It's hardly a deal breaker, but it's a nice professional touch. Before you send your manuscript off to the editor, pop in a title page at the very beginning of that file. There's a lot of acceptable ways to structure this, so don't stress about it. But a good rule of thumb is to include your book title or at least working title subtitle, along with your name and contact info. And of course, don't stress it, because your title and subtitle are probably going to change as you go along. I know our authors who work with us. We do keyword research and a whole bunch of brainstorming to make sure your title and subtitle are the best they possibly could be. By the way, are you still working on your title? Don't worry, I got you covered with this book title checklist right here and some fabulous examples in that video. Or you can check out this video right here, which is all about how to avoid manuscript draft confusion, because there's nothing worse than having to redo the work you did before because some of it got lost in a file mix up. All right, take your pick. I'm waiting for you.
