How to prepare your manuscript

What to include in your manuscript

Please include all of your text, titles, front and back matter in one document!
Title page — Title of the work, subtitle if any, author’s name
Optional front matter — other works by author, dedication, acknowledgements, foreword, preface, introduction, table of contents, etc.
Optional back matter — afterword, notes, bibliography, resources, recommended reading, glossary, index, etc.

Spelling and proofreading

Be sure your text is as clean and correct as you can make it. Catching typos before submission will save you money. Making extensive editorial corrections during the proofing process can incur additional fees.
Run spell check and grammar check if you have it.
Proofread again after you spell check! Let the text get “cold” — don’t even look at it for a few days, and then read again. You’ll see it with fresher eyes, and you may be surprised how many new edits you’ll make.

Fonts and typestyles

Easily readable text, where your intentions for your work come through clearly, is the goal here. Use minimal formatting.
The typeface, font size and spacing in your manuscript submission do not affect the final appearance of your book. All text is converted to our standard type style, 10 point New Baskerville Roman. Chapter titles and subheads are also formatted to our specifications, unless otherwise noted.
In your manuscript, use one of the “plain vanilla” typefaces that everyone has, like Arial, Times or Helvetica. Use the “bold” and “italics” options on your toolbar. Do not, for example, select text in Times New Roman and set the font to Times New Roman Italics. Using the toolbar type styles will dramatically reduce style loss in conversion.
Be consistent in your use of style sheets in your word processing program. Be sure that all body text uses the same style, whether it’s “Normal” or one you’ve defined. Use the same header style for all chapter titles, the same subhead styles for all subheads, and so on. In general, define new styles only if you really need to; fewer styles, used consistently, will give the best results.

Text formatting

Before you submit your manuscript, please check the items below. You can see the formatting characters by turning on the Show Paragraph option in MS Word. In other programs, it may be called Show Invisibles, Non-Printing Characters or something similar. You'll be able to see spaces, tab characters, returns and new line characters, page breaks and more.

Left justify or full justify all body text consistently throughout your document. If quotations or poetry are inserted, make sure that the method used (such as tabs or centering) is the same for all insertions.
Do not center “by eye,” using tabs and/or space bar. Use the centering tool in your application.
Do not use the tab key or spaces to indent the first line of paragraphs. Use the margin/indent settings of your word processing program instead.
Do not use unnecessary hard returns. Press the Enter or Return key only at the end of paragraphs or individual lines of a poem.
Do not use Shift-Return (new line) as the end-of-paragraph, or vice versa:
Do not use Return to force a new line in the middle of a paragraph. Please remove all new-line characters.
Do not use the Return or Enter key to space text vertically on a page or to indicate a new page. Instead, to indicate a new page, use the page break mark (Shift-Enter in MS Word) or section mark (Control-Enter, Command-Enter on Macintosh).
Do not use two spaces between sentences.
Do use “Typographers’ quotes” if your program has this option.
Use bold and/or italic for emphasis. Don’t use ALL CAPS. It’s harder to read and looks less professional. Use underlines only to indicate hyperlinks, not italics.
Avoid special characters like ligatures and fractions. We’ll add those for you. If you need other special characters within your text, like mathematical symbols, foreign characters, etc., please let us know before sending the manuscript. We’ll work with you to be sure your text is transmitted accurately.
If you wish to have a space within a chapter to indicate a change in speaker, time, location, situation, etc., please make this break highly recognizable. Preferably, enter Return to end your paragraph, type three asterisks (*) or similar indicator on the new line, enter Return again, and begin your new paragraph. Use that exact method consistently with every break.

Other text requirements

If you have notes, please group them as endnotes, rather than footnotes dispersed throughout the text. Endnotes may be placed at the end of each chapter or all together at the end of the manuscript.
Please delete any headers or footers. They will be added according to our specifications during the formatting process.
Make sure all chapter headings or other sequential naming conventions follow the same pattern. If you capitalize a chapter, make sure you capitalize all of them. Whether you use roman numerals, numbers or titles, use a consistent method throughout the manuscript.

Saving and sending your manuscript

Upload MS Word (.doc), Rich Text Format (.rtf) or plain text (.txt) documents.
If you are unable to save in one of these file formats, please contact us about possible alternatives.
Do not email your manuscript to us! It must be uploded during the online sign-up process.
Do not send documents as html pages, in the body of an email or as an attachment to an email.
Do not send read-only files.
Upload all text and graphics files at the same time, through the electronic sign-up form. If all your files are not ready, please wait to place your order until all elements of your book are complete.