I've been looking all over the web for a nice list of how one's manuscript should be formatted to send to agents and editors. I can find parts of the rules everywhere. Most agent's sites have a tiny blurb with either the most important things to them, or a brief summary, or, most common, formatting specific to them.
I finally found a post at the Author! Author! blog that has it all, all in one post:
http://www.annemini.com/?cat=2105
The post to which you refer (at the “Author! Author!” blog) is pretty good, but not perfect.
ReplyDeleteAnne strikes me as the type of person who will try to convince people that she is right by shouting the loudest. Her repeated use of the word “standard” is empty of force when she says to “do as Strunk & White say” (referring to the book The Elements of Style) but then gives “rules” that are at odds with that very book. Just one example is italics, which the book (as opposed to Anne) says are “indicated in manuscript by underscoring.” Nor does she discuss the historical reasons behind the rule encouraging the use of two spaces after a sentence, and why it has (sometimes) changed.
I would instead refer your readers to a real standard of manuscript style, such as the 1970 printing of Webster's New World Dictionary, Second College Edition, or some other source that has a few years behind it and has not been subjected to revisions by modern—ill-informed—editors.