There is a Standard Manuscript Format, and most editors at least conform to this standard. However, Standard Manuscript Format is in some ways a relic of the typewriter. Although there is good rationale behind all its features, the necessity for complex formatting and file compatibility can be an issue.

A Plain Text Manuscript Format would have advantages for both writers and editors. In addition to simplicity, universal compatibility, and superior archiving, a plain text manuscript presents several other advantages. The file can be easily viewed in any preferred font, transfered to an e-book reader, pasted into the body of an email, and formatted for electronic or print publication.

A Plain Text Manuscript Format can be considered universal because it can be created or read on any computer with virtually any software. It can even be accessed from a command prompt, created on a typewriter or handwritten in a notebook. The features of the proposed format are outlined in the example below. Please note: this is a proposal only, and a suggestion for writers who wish to use plain text for their personal composition, editing, and file storage. If you are submitting a manuscript for publication, you should always follow the editor’s guidelines for manuscript formatting.

Joe Writer
4 Contact Info
City, NY 10010
(212) 555-5555
joewriter@mail.com
www.joewriter.com

200 words

PLAIN TEXT MANUSCRIPT FORMAT

by Joe Writer

At the top of the file should be the writer’s name and contact information. Two lines below that, the estimated word count. Four lines below that, the title in all caps. Two lines below that, the byline. The body of the manuscript should start four lines below the byline.

All text should be left justified with no indentation. Add an empty line between paragraphs for readability. Each paragraph should represent a single line of text. Word wrapping will make the text readable and printable. To add an extra line for a section break insert the number symbol like so:

#

To indicate italics, text should be surrounded by underscore marks. For example you might mention a magazine, such as _Asimov’s_ or _The New Yorker_. This will make it easy to search for italicised text and replace with italics for actual publication.

Use only a single space after punctuation. This will keep the text clean and consistent. A double space is not needed, and not preferred if using the electronic text for publication.

To indicate an em dash–puctuation that sets off a phrase–use two hyphens. To indicate…an elipses, use three periods.

Define the end of your manuscript with three number symbols on the last line of the file, like so:

###

That’s all there is to it. Since text files do not contain formatting information, it is not necessary to specify a font, margins, headers or page numbering. Two notable drawbacks to this Plain Text Manuscript Format are the lack of line spacing to allow for editing marks and the lack of page numbers for referencing areas of text. This is a legitimate concern. Solutions include saving and editing as a .pdf or adding desired additional formatting for a print copy. If printing the document, a text editor can print with page numbers and additional header information. A word processor can add formatting as necessary.

Part III of this series will detail how to covert plain text manuscripts to Standard Manuscript Format and other tips to working with plain text.

Plain Text for Writers, Part I: An Argument for the Use of Plain Text

The camaraderie is always inspiring, and the Saturday night readings were amazing. I heard some really great stories by some seriously talented writers, all written within the previous 24 hour period. It’s like hearing a new anthology, fresh off the press.

NaNoWriMo is this month and people all over are attempting to write 50,000 word novels. I can’t help thinking we should have a National Short Story Writing Weekend as well, when people could collectively try their hand at writing stories in a 24 hour period. There’s something exhilarating about the experience of creating fiction with a deadline.

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or this:

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Good luck reading your brilliant work. In contrast, a .txt file (plain text) can be opened in a readable format by any text editor or word processor on any platform. It can even be accessed from a command line.

Without getting too political (software companies control the decoding of your information), or philosophical (WYSIWYG is not what you think), or ideological (plain text is free text), the following will argue for the use of plain text for writers on the basis of its simplicity and content oriented focus, cross-platform compatibility, and benefits for long term archiving.

Writing is the logical and artful arrangement of words to express thoughts. It is not choosing fonts, indentations, headers, footers, gutters, and margins. Formatting is best done when preparing a document for a specific purpose or publication. Writing in plain text offers a simple environment focused on the task at hand. Your manuscripts will stay clean and free of unnecessary code. Plain text can be easily pasted into other applications, and can always be formatted later using a word processor.

Everybody knows there are compatibility issues with word processors. Even software that claims to be compatible with .doc or .rtf, for example, sometimes have issues. Writers need to know that they can access their files from any computer or device, use the text in other applications, and share them without worrying about compatibility issues. No other file format is as cross compatible as plain text.

Now more than ever, master documents are likely to be stored in electronic format. Not only are plain text files more compatible than any other file format, they take up less disk space and avoid a lot of the data storage problems encountered with other file formats. Say you need to access a short story you wrote on a computer in 1985? If you saved it in plain text, it’s no problem. Want your files to be readable in the year 2185? Again, save them in plain text.

Alas, there are some obstacles to using plain text as a writer. The first is finding a good text editor. Most word processors can save documents in plain text, so you could really use anything, but a text editor is designed to work with plain text. Most text editor are made with programmers in mind though, and many lack features that are important to writers, like spell check and word count. There are some good free ones though, and some even better commercial ones. I recommend NoteTab Pro for a feature rich environment and Q10 for simplicity.

Acceptability is also an issue. Standard manuscript formats are based on typewritten manuscripts and can only be formatted using a word processor. Unless plain text formats are adopted, editors are still going to want manuscripts as an .rtf in standard manuscript format. This means it’s necessary to format the text file before sending it out. An extra step, but it’s easy to do, and worth it for the benefits of working with plain text.

Plain Text for Writers, Part II: A Proposal for a Plain Text Manuscript Format

Additional Information:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plain_text

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Text_file

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Text_editor

Paper books will surely persist for a long time to come, but book stores may not. The book industry is changing quickly. I’m not sure anybody really knows what it will look like ten years from now, but it’s likely to be very different.

Will the downfall of big chain bookstores allow smaller stores to flourish again, or are we seeing the end of brick and mortar bookstores all together?

I wrote the first draft of “The Gift” at weekend writing retreat. Previously I had lugged along a laser printer to these things, but the printer being out of ink, I left it behind, editing my work on screen and using a kindle for the Saturday night reading. Despite the lack of paper, all went well.

Of course, I figured I would print it out when I got home for further editing, but that didn’t happen. I ended up re-reading it and making editing notes on the kindle. With the final changes and corrections entered into the computer, it’s ready to submit, mostly via email.

The question remains if the editing process can be as efficient or effective without paper and pen, but I think it worked well for this project anyway. Some writers have pretty much gone paperless with their work. I’m not sure I’m ready to make that total commitment, but I have to admit I cringe every time I shell out $70 for a printer cartridge. And with this recent success, perhaps I’ll be doing that a little less.

The process starts with some heavy brain-work. It may appear that I am just laying around on my bed, sitting in the bathtub, or staring out the window, but bit by bit I’m building the makings of a story around my initial idea. I try to figure out who the protagonist is, the central conflict, and get some sense of a beginning, middle and end.

Once I feel like I have a bit of story, I really try to refine it, sometimes in my head, and sometimes on paper. The essence of this step is telling the story to myself over and over and breaking it down into scenes. Each time I revise a little, adding new images, taking out plot that doesn’t work, refining the plot that does, until I have an outline with a well defined conflict and a clear beginning, middle and end mapped out in scenes. At this point, I may have a sense for what the story is about thematically as well.

Then comes the actual writing. Generally I follow my outline, but there are always surprises, details to be worked out, and new things to be discovered and invented when putting the words on the page. There is also the craft and the art of the language to attend to as well. Mostly I just try to plow ahead toward the end, not editing or over-thinking too much.

The editing/rewriting process is still to come, but it’s a great feeling when you get to the end and have a first draft. That flicker of an idea, whatever it was, is now a story, and despite all the work, there’s something sort of magical about that.

Is the paper book in its death thoes? I’m not sure that’s true, but something is definitely happening. It seems to me there will always be a place for paper books, however diminished, but there’s little doubt that the system for publishing, marketing and distributing books is in a state of dramatic transformation. Where all the pieces are going to land is the subject for a lot of speculation in the news, but I feel like I just read the writing on the wall.

Also, I’ve thought about getting a Kindle.

I’m looking forward to a lot of exciting work in 2011, including writing Book 3 in The Three Earths and again, as many short stories as I can find time for. Hopefully a few more updates here as well.

Best wishes for the new year!

I had the idea for this story while standing in my living room one day and thinking about how odd it was that there was this expanse of dark space just beneath the floor, an emptiness that we seldom think of, and in which something strange might dwell.

I’ve had various adventures in the crawlspace of my house. Once I made an exhaustive search for something dead that I never found. It was stinking up the whole house. If you ever have this problem, don’t worry the smell goes away in a week or so. Just don’t think about it too much afterward. Another time I went in there trying to get into my garage after locking myself out, but the hole that had once been there had been sealed up. And there really was a mummified cat down there when I first moved in.

Hope you enjoy the story! Don’t call me if you hear something in your crawlspace.

My own history of playing the piano is long in years but short on skill and practice. I played for two or three years when I was in middle school. Took it up again briefly when I was in college, and again in 2008. This time I was keen on figuring out various technical aspects of music that never seemed adequately explained to me.

I did manage to unravel a few mysteries, but many more questions constantly arose. In the midst of all this research I had the idea to write a story about a cursed scale. I have long been a fan of H.P. Lovecraft’s story “The Music of Erich Zann” and had in mind to write my own musical tale of horror set at Auxerre University.

I am rather fond of this story. It is the fifth one I have written with some connection to the strange town of Auxerre, Wisconsin. Two others can also be read online, “Crawlspace,” and “Old Growth.” Many of the details about Auxerre and the University trace their way back to my own experiences as an undergrad at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.