Writer Tips: Formating

So you’ve written an excellent story rife with memorable characters, superlative prose, and an engaging theme, yet it keeps getting rejected five minutes after you’ve emailed it. Why? Have you checked your formatting? Many, many markets will reject your submission unread if it isn’t formatted to the industry standard. This is the first (and often fatal) strike a great many writers make. It’s a shame they don’t teach this sort of thing in most creative writing classes.

A good, generic format looks like this: Real Name; Address; City, State, Zip; Country; and your email in the upper left side of the manuscript. Put your approximate word count on the right side. Further down, center your title in all caps; skip a line, then center By; skip a line, then center the name you'll be published as. Skip several lines, write your story, then center THE END when you're done.

In the top header of each page after the first put: Story Name/Your Name/ Page #.

Stories should be double spaced, 12pt. New Times Roman font is most often requested but many people have preferences. If you want something in italics, underline it instead. DO NOT use bold print.

Many markets have specifics, Read Their Guidelines! By not adhering to proper formatting, writers give editors the idea that they’re ignorant of the rules or too lazy to bother with them, not the impression you want to make. For more information, look under "Writing Help" at Ralan's.

Email Accounts

I’d like to share a bit of unsolicited advice with any writers perusing this blog.

It would behoove anyone who intends to submit a story for publication to invest a little time and get an email account independent of their ISP. I feel bad for writers when I send out a rejection (or worse, an acceptance) and it bounces back because they’ve switched providers or couldn’t afford the service any longer. Sometimes writers send an email notifying me of their email change, but it isn’t like I can pin a note to the original submission. From now on, I’m going to ask them to send the story again from the new address and I’ll swap it out with the old one.

Don’t be the writer who gets frustrated and sends an angry letter regarding how long you’ve waited for word about your submission, only to receive an email telling you that your story was rejected three months prior to your old account.

Get a Yahoo or Goggle account (or another of your choice, it doesn’t matter) and try to use it for writing purposes only. If you switch your ISP or it doesn’t work for some reason, you can always access your independent account at a friend’s house, at a library, or wherever.

Don’t let the second choice do the happy dance with your book or magazine deal, get an independent email account

Cover Letters

I've had this thing for a while now and only used it for class work, but my friend Stewart shamed me into posting, so here goes. As the assistant editor at Dark Wisdom magazine, I see a lot of cover letters. A cover letter is your first impression, yet many that I see make the writer sound desperate and/or don't provide the kind of raw information that tells the reader that this person is a professional I've made a "form" letter that should cover the bases (alter as you'd like and always read a market's guidelines to find out if they have a certain way of doing things) but first, let me tell you some things not to put in one:

Don't put a time limit on how long you're willing to wait before submitting somewhere else. If a writer isn't willing to wait for a reply, he or she is in the wrong business.

Don't challenge the editor. Every so often I get some variation of "This may be too dark for you." Which usually translates as "This is a craptacular slaughterfest." or "The whole plot is about butchering babies." If you think a story may be too dark for a market, it most likely is and you've lost my interest in it as an editor.

Don't give a detailed synopsis of your story. You may want to talk a little bit about the theme of the piece or how you played with common horror tropes, but don't overexplain the story. Why should I read it when I feel like I already have?

Don't ask for a critique. 99% of the time, I just don't have the time to give any personal thoughts on a story. Once in a great while I have a lull where I can help someone who needs it (and usually I get flayed for it on a blog) but it's very rare. I suggest a simple "I'm open to suggestions if you have the time." It lets an editor know you're open-minded but not pushy or needy.

Never give out your Social Security number. I've had this happen a few times now. I already have your name and address, don't send me the final piece in the trifecta of identity fraud. We may need it if we're publishing you and we'll let you know then.

Don't babble. A good many people try to be witty...most aren't. Keep it brief and try not to sound too cool for school.

Anyway, here's that sample cover letter:

Dear editor,

Please consider "(Story Name here)" for publication in (Magazine Name here). I'm offering (whatever rights you are providing, usually First American Publishing Rights). Thank you for your time, I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Your Name


Note that stories are always in quotes and magazines are in italics. You don't need your address here because it's on the manuscript. When you get published you can list a couple of the mags and books you were in but don't list more than a few because no one cares after they see the biggest names you have under your belt. Again, check your market's guidelines for any requests in this area. Don't kill your chances of getting published over something easily fixed.