The Basics: Manuscript Formatting

As requested in last week's comment boxes, we're going to chat about formatting.

MECHANICS:

The basics are simple:  Double-spaced, 12-point font, normal margins.  I like to start each new chapter 10 lines down, but you'll hear different schools of thought on that.

As for italics:  Use them.  Old school thought says "convert them to underlines."  But in this age of advanced word processing, that's no longer necessary.

PARAGRAPH RULES:

There are two things that warrant the start of a new paragraph:

CHANGE OF TOPIC, ACTION, SCENE

and

NEW DIALOGUE

Dialogue tends to trip people up sometimes.  The basic rule is that EVERY TIME somebody new speaks, it's a new paragraph.  Period.

Beats go with the person who is speaking, NOT in the paragraph before or after the dialogue.

EXAMPLE:

"I hate you."

Mary fiddled with her top button.  Wouldn't look at Daryll to save her life.  He sighed.

"At least I know where I stand."  Mary looked up as he turned away.

"And don't come back."

The above example is ALL WRONG.  Mary's beats belong with Mary's dialogue, and Daryll's beats belong with HIS dialogue.

CORRECT:

"I hate you."  Mary fiddled with her top button.  Wouldn't look at Daryll to save her life.  

He sighed.  "At least I know where I stand."  

Mary looked up as he turned away.  "And don't come back."

There are also times when, for the sake of cleanliness, it makes sense to start a new paragraph even though the same person is talking.  I'm especially referring to situations where there is a lot of beat action going on after the initial words are spoken.

EXAMPLE:

"My chicken exploded."  Juliet burst into tears, the grisly scene playing itself over and over in her brain.  She felt Greg's pimply arms go round her, tasted the saltiness of her snot as she rubbed trembling palms across her face.  It was hard enough facing life without red beets; the exploding chicken threatened to undo her.  Destroy her.  She buried her face in Greg's AC/DC tee shirt and wished it didn't smell like sauerkraut.  "I'm sorry I wouldn't marry you," she whispered.

In the above example, the final line of dialogue would work just as well in its own paragraph.  It's correct the way it is, but it would be cleaner -- and have more emphasis -- if it were separate.

"My chicken exploded."  Juliet burst into tears, the grisly scene playing itself over and over in her brain.  She felt Greg's pimply arms go round her, tasted the saltiness of her snot as she rubbed trembling palms across her face.  It was hard enough facing life without red beets; the exploding chicken threatened to undo her.  Destroy her.  She buried her face in Greg's AC/DC tee shirt and wished it didn't smell like sauerkraut.  

"I'm sorry I wouldn't marry you," she whispered.

FINALLY, A QUICK NOTE ON PUNCTUATION:

Punctuation goes INSIDE the double quotes of dialogue:

"I love you," Vladimir said.

Not

"I love you", Vladimir said.

Quotes INSIDE quotes should look like this:

"What does 'sort-of girlfriend' mean, exactly?"

If they're at the end of the sentence, they should look like this:

"I'm not in favor of your little 'plan'," Huffy said.

Also? It's okay to have a small desktop reference for this sort of thing, until you don't need it anymore.  I adore Lynn Truss's EATS, SHOOTS, AND LEAVES for basic comma and apostrophe wisdom.  And all writers should own a copy of THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE.

GRAMMAR GIRL is pretty awesome, too.  

And there you have it -- this is as basic as it gets!  Hope it's helpful.