Trivia Tuesday–Kay Springsteen

I’m so pleased to have my wonderful friend and fellow Astraea Press author/anthology contributor Kay Springsteen in the hot seat today. I know she is as proud of Matrimonial Mayhem as I am. Kay’s contribution to this work is Camp Wedding, which features the cast of characters from Heartsight. The end of Heartsight finds Trish and Dan married and about to embark on their new life as husband and wife. Camp Wedding shows us that a bride’s best laid plans can mean only one thing – something will inevitably go wrong. Matrimonial Mayhem can be purchased at Amazon for $5.99 ~  Astraea Press for $5 ~ Barnes & Noble for $5.99 and all proceeds go to benefit the Governor of Alabama's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives for the hardest storm-hit areas of the state.

Now, time to pick Kay’s brain with some questions.

Who’s your favorite villain either from a book or a movie? Silar from Heroes. I think he was less of a villain than he was portrayed, and really just misunderstood. Also, the Man In Black on Lost. After I learned his back story, I came to believe Jacob was the one in the wrong, although not out of any malicious reason; rather, he was misguided.

Where’s the one place you’d love to visit? Well, it WAS the Yellowstone in the Rocky Mountains until the grizzly bear attack last week. That kind of made me re-think my bucket list goals of which states to hit.

You and me too!!  Who’s the one person you’d love to meet? Lori Karayianni – she’s ½ of the writing team that comprises Tori Carrington. She and I are Facebook friends and I’d love to meet her in person. She sounds like a lot of fun. Not to be outdone by meeting Kim Bowman in person, but I already KNOW that’s gonna happen. Same with J. Gunnar Grey. One day…

Oh, that’s a given! And soon, I hope! Do you prefer to read a book written in first person or third person? Third person all the way, baby.

What genre do you love to read but would never write? Techno-thrillers (e.g., Tom Clancy), or Science Fiction – the hard core kind (e.g., Herbert, Heinlein, etc.). I love reading and watching both of these genres, but there is so much research into pure science to do in order to write it correctly.

WOW! I wouldn’t have guessed that! Do you prefer to read stand alone books or a series? I love stand alone books that have other stand alone books as part of the series. I don’t mind an occasional trilogy with cliff hanger endings as long as I don’t have to wait too long between books. But it’s the revisiting of characters and catching glimpses of old favorites in new stories that really makes it great for me.

And you do a killer job with that in your books Lifeline Echoes and Elusive Echoes! And, of course, with Heartsight and Camp Wedding. I’m so glad you shared Dan and Trish’s story with us and I’m especially glad you offered to share and excerpt from Camp Wedding with us.

The organ began to play the one song Trish had insisted on, Pachelbel's Canon. They were only a couple of hours late. Guests had resettled themselves into pews as everyone waited for the bride to finish getting ready. Now the moment was here, and as he listened to the chorus of ʺAw, how cute," Dan knew Trish was making her way toward him.

Next to him, Jake cleared his throat and murmured softly, ʺYour bride has tethered your child to her with a very colorful ribbon attached to them both."

Dan stopped himself from laughing out loud, but only barely. His lips twitched as he picked up the tinkling sound of jingle bells in perfect rhythm with Trish’s footsteps, and from then on out, he had no trouble visualizing the woman he loved walking along the aisle in his direction.

As Trish stopped next to him and the organ music drifted to silence, her sweet flowery scent wafted in his direction . . . mingled with the definite fragrance of cotton candy. His mind drifted to the morning he’d met these two incredible females, and he acknowledged the countless ways his life had been changed since that day. He could no longer imagine himself living alone, hidden from the rest of the world, soaking in a vat of his own pity. Trish and Bella had brought love and joy to his life. He was, as his father had said, a very lucky man.

Dan barely heard the words. He must have said the right things at the right time. Jake didn’t poke him in the ribs once during the ceremony.

Thank you so much for stopping by. Kay has graciously offered one lucky commenter a PDF copy of either Heartsight or Lifeline Echoes. You can follow Kay on her writing adventures (pssst…she’s working on a killer story right now titled Heartsent) on her Blog ~ Facebook ~ Twitter

You can also purchase her other books by following the links above.

Trivia Tuesday–Matrimonial Mayhem

I have the honor and privilege to be involved in a very special project with five of my fellow Astraea Press authors. We've collaborated to create a Wedding Anthology titled Matrimonial Mayhem to help the Alabama families who suffered at the hands of the deadly tornadoes in April 2011. Proceeds from the sale of this awesome eBook go to benefit those victims, so pass the word along and jump over to one of the buy links and help out.
This week, I thought I’d feature, well, me and my story The Ballad of Brenda and Willard. This story is based on a true urban legend. The third time was the charm in the wedding tale of my mom and dad, but exactly what date their anniversary should be celebrated is anybody's guess. Read the story to find out!!
Now, the trivia part of my blog!!
Who’s the one person you’d love to meet? Robert Redford all the way!
What’s your favorite Disney cartoon? I love Finding Nemo, but I also really like Toy Story 3.
What book do you read over and over again? Ok, I have four books that I read at least once a year. Whitney, My Love by Judith McNaught and Forever, Forever and Always, and Always by Jude Deveraux.
Who’s your favorite villain either from a book or a movie? Hehe, I have to go with Kirk Douglas as the villain in the movie The Villain. LOVE him!!!
Thank you so much for stopping by. Please take the time to help out a worthy cause and read a great book! Matrimonial Mayhem can be purchased at Amazon for $5.99 ~ Barnes & Noble for $5.99 ~ Astraea Press for $5.
And, right now you can check out my paranormal romance Wayward Soul for $.99! Amazon ~ Astraea Press ~ Barnes & Noble
Thank you so much for stopping by and for your support!
Happy reading!
~Kim

Quotes and Lines

I asked the wonderful authors at Astraea Press to share their favorite lines from their books.

Happy reading!

~Kim

“Enough games, lady, tell me what’s going on. Is that the thing I shot earlier?” he asked, his eyes still transfixed on the mass of half werewolf half man sprawled on the sidewalk.
“Yes.”
“Why is it after you?”
“It isn’t. It’s after you.”

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God help them all! How could she tell someone he wasn't going to be rescued? What could she say to a man when her words were likely to be the last he'd ever hear?

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He felt the smile tug his lips upward and realized he'd just handed his heart to a six-­year-­old for safekeeping.

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“That’s Ariel.”

“No, it isn’t.”

Caleb frowned at his son. “Joshua, yes it is. Her name is Ariel.”

“She doesn’t look like a mermaid to me.”

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Something soft and annoying whooshed past his face. Faust brushed at it, but it was already gone and he was too fragging sleepy to care. He dropped his arm to the bed.
There was no bed.

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Jennifer stared past them and watched him. As usual, his blood warmed to her living poetry. But this time Faust examined the sensation without passion, seeking beyond his earlier assumption that he’d fallen finally, truly in love. He found that somewhere between his lust and his liking lurked a desperate yearning, too shy to put itself forward. He’d never encountered it before. If this was love, at least, like Donne’s, it was a reasoning and patient love. When I am gone, dream me some happiness.

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“How many horses he offer your family?” Sally stood stiff.
“There has been no mention of horses.” Emma shook her head. Mr. Tucker and Kale stood silent and unyielding.
Sally turned to Kale. “You no offer horse for your woman?”
Kale’s stoic expression never wavered. “I give one Shetland pony for her.”

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Lizzie- “We can do this the hard way or the easy way,” she said.
“We’re doing it the easy way, ‘cause it ain’t getting done.” (Frank's response)

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Cassidy Jones needs a holiday and her friend, Tammy’s cottage in New Bay sounds perfect. The beach could heal the bruises from losing her job and her fiancé.
Josh Parker is also looking forward to a much needed break after eighteen months of non-stop work. His friend Tammy’s cottage would be just right for some time alone.
Or would it?

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Jerome Mayer is tall, dark and dangerous to know. Normally Gemma would run a mile, but with a freshly broken heart maybe it’s time for this good girl to take a walk on the wild side.

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“Dean, yes. Dean Mitchell. Nice to meet you too, Cliff.” He spoke fast and with a nervous catch in his voice, but each syllable cracked her concentration until it shattered like a boulder hitting a car windshield. She went to look, and her heart nearly stopped. It was him.
It was him.

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She saw his eyes travel slowly from her face downward, stopping
first at her lips, then at her breasts, then going all the way down to
her ankles. She felt his stare as if it was a warm hand moving gently
down her body, making her slightly uncomfortable.

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New Orleans was a sea of appealing women with pleasing accents flowing from pretty lips, but there was something about this girl’s beauty, something that kept Justin’s eyes planted on her. She caught him gawking at her, and he didn’t bother to look away. Humiliation was just another useless human emotion he wouldn't even pretend to possess.

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Before she fully realized it, he stood above her and extended a hand. “Come.”
“Come?” she echoed. Something didn’t add up, but she couldn’t quite place a finger on it. She glanced from his hand to his face, back to his hand. Then clarity struck. This moment seemed
familiar, as if she’d lived it before. Without Natalie consciously deciding, her hand sought out his.
“To my home, to my city. You have three weeks, after all.”
Her reaching hand halted. “Three weeks?”

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There are a multitude of rules that must be obeyed when finding the perfect sacrifice for the great water dragon, Lord Oceina. The sacrifice must be female. She may not be older than
eighteen years of age. She must be pure like the snow, un-tainted in any way.

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Violet thought some of the tears on her cheeks belonged to Matt, but no, a pro football player wouldn’t cry just because a woman said she loved him.

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$.99 SALE!!!

 $.99 $.99 $.99 $.99  $.99 $.99 $.99

YES! You read that right! You can purchase Wayward Soul for $.99 right now at AMAZON  and at BARNES AND NOBLE. YIPPEEE!!! I'm posting the book blurb and chapter one below so you can check it out.

BLURB:

When Zanna Seoul accidentally causes the death of a fellow spirit guide’s charge while trying to save the life of the man she loves, she is stripped of her position and banished to Earth to die. In the spirit world, one doesn’t mess with what’s written.

With Zanna no longer guiding him and his memory of her erased, Owen Nash is left wide open as the target of the vengeful spirit guide who feels he’s been wronged. A guide who also happens to be a werewolf. Once on Earth, Zanna refuses to stand by and watch Owen die, so she intervenes again, setting off a chain of events that could mean death for all of them if she doesn’t go back and undo the mess she’s made. Can Zanna succeed before the werewolf does?

SNEAK PEEK:

Chapter One

“Owen, please don’t go to work today.”

Zanna slapped a hand over her mouth. Did she just say that out loud? What the heck was she trying to do? She was Owen’s spirit guide for goodness sake. Her job was to make sure he followed his charted course while living on Earth. To be the invisible force that directed him toward which decision to make. She knew better than to try and change fate. If his chart said he was supposed to die, that was that. His life had already been mapped out from beginning to end before he was born and it was pretty much

set in stone. Unfortunately, right now she wasn’t his spirit guide, but the woman who loved him.

“Did you say something?” Owen asked from the kitchen.

Zanna stiffened. If she hadn’t already been sitting on his sofa, she would have fallen to the floor. Had Owen heard her? “No, nothing.” Yes. Please don’t go to work. Stay here. Stay safe.

“Do you need me to drive you home? I appreciate you staying here last night with Jamie and getting him off to school,” Owen said, walking back to the living room with two cups of coffee. He sat down on the coffee table and handed her a cup.

“No, I’ll be fine,” Zanna said. I need to go look at your chart on the other side and see if there’s any way to stop you from dying.

“If you keep staring at me like that, I’m gonna to be late for work.” He smiled, revealing the dimple in his right cheek.

Inspiration struck. Maybe she was forbidden from telling Owen to stay home, but if he made the choice on his own…

“Well, we can’t have that, Lieutenant Nash.” She leaned forward, sat the coffee down, and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him on the couch with her.

Desire flashed in Owen’s eyes. “Forget work. I spent all night chasing the bad guy.” His mouth captured hers, urging her lips to part. The minute they did, he deepened the kiss and her conscience receded to a distant part of her mind. Zanna ran her fingers down Owen’s sides and around his back, pulling him closer, her hands dipping lower.

Breathless, Owen broke the kiss to ask, “Are you sure? I mean, I know you want to wait…”

Was she sure? As one of the few spirit guides who had never lived on earth as a human before, she didn’t have a lot of experience in the romantic depart. Slowly, she emerged from the blissful daydream where she was trying to find a place to hide from the impossible dilemma she faced.

Do my job and let Owen die or save him and risk causing bedlam on Earth. Why did it have to be written in his chart that he had to die? Would it really be so disastrous if he lived?

“Earth to Zanna,” Owen said.

“I’m sorry. Did you say something?”

Owen furrowed his eyebrows. “Yeah, I asked if you wanted to stop. I’m sorry. I freaked you out, didn’t I?”

Zanna took his face in her hands. “No, you didn’t scare me at all. It’s just—”

“It’s fine, I get it. I’m sorry.” Owen pushed back off the couch and moved to the door. “I gotta go to work.” He grabbed his gun and badge off the shelf by the door and turned the handle. He released the handle and raked his hand through his hair. With a loud sigh, he removed the gun and put it back on the shelf and then walked back to Zanna. He took both her hands in his and placed a tender kiss on her lips. Tears of relief streamed down her cheek.

“Please don’t cry. I hate it when you cry. I was a jerk.”

“I didn’t mean…It’s not you…It’s just…It’s just…” It’s just that if you go to work, you’ll be killed and I’ll lose you.

He caressed her face with his thumbs. “Why don’t I call and have Smitty bring me the reports I need to finish, and we can spend the day doing whatever you want,” Owen offered.

Zanna’s heart sang with joy. “Yes!”

Owen gave her a sheepish smile. “Okay. Let me call work and then I’ll be all yours.” He opened his phone and dialed.

Zanna fell back on the couch, relief washing through her. Her mind reeled trying to figure out how this was possible. How had it been so easy to keep Owen from going

to work, when his chart said he would end up being shot and killed in the line of duty today?

“Zanna.”

His voice had taken on a somber note. The laughter completely gone. The way he said her name sent cold shivers up and down her spine. She couldn’t look up, didn’t want to see the solemn expression on his face. She started to tremble and beads of perspiration broke out on her temple. If she didn’t get a grip, she wouldn’t be able to maintain her

physical body and it would be cast back to the spirit side. Owen would then drop dead from shock at watching her disappear.

He sat beside her on the sofa and placed his hand on her forehead. “Are you o—”

His cell phone started chirping. Cursing under his breath, he answered. “Nash.”

Zanna couldn’t hear what the caller was saying, but from the way Owen’s jaw tightened and the vein on the side of his neck throbbed, it wasn’t good.

“I’m on my way.” He snapped the phone closed then tossed in on the table. “I’m so sorry, Zanna. We have a really good lead on the guy we think’s been killing all these young girls. I have to follow it. Why don’t you stay here and wait for me.”

Her throat was so tight she couldn’t speak, so she just gave him a tight smile and nodded.

“Don’t hate me. You know I wouldn’t go if I didn’t have to.”

“I love you, Owen,” she said, her eyes intent.

He pressed his lips to her brow. “Why, I don’t know, but I’m glad you do. I love you, too. Wait for me.”

A few minutes later, she was alone in Owen’s house. Frozen in place, hoping time would stand still.

I can’t lose him. I don’t care what his fate is supposed to be! Think, think, think. There has to be a way to stop Owen from dying without causing chaos and destruction to ensue.

Now Zanna understood why spirit guides were only permitted to take on a physical form to help a charge as a last resort. Why too much interaction between a life director and the human they helped protect was forbidden. The temptation to rewrite a person’s destiny, which in turn would cause pandemonium, was too great. She picked a pillow up off the couch and screamed into it, loud. There was nothing she could do to save Owen.

WORKSHOP WEDNESDAY

I Feel a Contraction Coming On

If I had to pick the one mistake I see writers make over and over it would be that they don’t use contractions. I’m serious. This is by far the biggest correction I make when editing a manuscript. Was not to wasn’t, is not to isn’t, are not to aren’t…the list is endless.

This is jarring to read, it interrupts the flow of the story, and it makes the writing seem choppy. Fiction is supposed to sound natural, and when we speak, we use contractions. Here are some examples from my book Wayward Soul. Read them out loud and see which example sounds better:

A - Please do not go to work. Stay here. Stay safe.

B - Please don’t go to work. Stay here. Stay safe.

A - “Well, we cannot have that, Lieutenant Nash.”

B - “Well, we can’t have that, Lieutenant Nash.”

A - Zanna took his face in her hands. “No, you did not scare me at all.”

B - Zanna took his face in her hands. “No, you didn’t scare me at all.”

A - “Please do not cry. I hate it when you cry. I was a jerk.”

B - “Please don’t cry. I hate it when you cry. I was a jerk.”

Even if you read these examples to yourself, the sentences that don’t have contractions probably felt awkward. The others, more natural and easier to follow. I guarantee this small change will make a world of difference in your manuscript.

On the other side of the coin, sometimes it’s better not to use a contraction. For instance, if you want to add emphasis like in this example from my short story The Ballad of Brenda and Willard:

A - “I cannot believe that you care so little about me that you don’t even remember our anniversary. How dare you. Our anniversary is not March tenth.”

B - “I can’t believe that you care so little about me that you don’t even remember our anniversary. How dare you. Our anniversary isn’t March tenth.”

Either scenario above would work, however example A clearly helps show the character’s emotion and anger just a tad better. This is part of developing your voice as a writer. Just don’t overdo it.

No matter how many times you edit your manuscript, you’ll likely miss some of these. The best way to find them, and avoid spending hours reading and re-reading your story, is to use FIND and REPLACE feature in your word processing program like this:

Whala! Simple. Easy. You can repeat this process to fix any words that should be contracted.

Another alternative is to just use the Find function and search for the word NOT, for example, then click the Reading Highlight button and Highlight all.

This is the quickest way to find words that should be turned into contractions, but it’s certainly not the easiest way to fix them because once you click in the document and make a change, the highlights disappear and you have to repeat the process. However, this will without a doubt ensure you haven’t missed anything. So my advice is to use the table below to help you figure out which words should be contracted, use the Find/Replace function to fix them, and then use the Find function with Highlight to double check yourself.

 

This list isn’t all inclusive and there may still be some contractions that you miss, but just this one change will make your manuscript much better and more appealing to those publishers when you send it outJ

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY

It's a Father's Day Six Sentence Sunday!!!! Hope it's a happy one for all! I get to honor my father and remind everyone about a great anthology that I'm a part of for Astraea Press. My six sentences come from Matrimonial Mayhem. So without further ado, here's my six from The Ballad of Brenda and Willard.

My parents’ wedding is the stuff of legends; urban legends, that is. You know what I’m talking about. One of those things where your friend’s cousin’s brother’s uncle’s sister-in-law was there, but you never hear the person’s name or actually speak to them. In fact, my mother never signed the marriage application or license. Well, she was only fifteen and so legally she couldn’t, but if not her, then who did? It’s a mystery I intend to unravel.

Oh, what a story it is! Plus, the five other great stories you get. Just click HERE. For $5 you get a great read and help the tornado victims. Also, don't forget to go check out all the other great posts for Six Sentence Sunday.

Workshop Wednesday with Kay Springsteen

Why Your Book Needs a Realtor

This is it! You’ve decided to move. Maybe your house is too big, maybe it’s too small. Maybe you just want to live someplace else. Either way,you’ve decided you’re finished with the house you’re living in. It’s time to sell it. To do that, you have to put it on the market. So let’s say you’ve been living in this house long enough to get comfortable. You’ve made a few improvements, tweaked a few things. Maybe you’ve put on an addition. And along the way, your kids have grown, so you’ve added growth charts with some cute little nicks in the woodwork of their bedroom doors. Nothing big, and it’s so cute and heartwarming, you just know the house’s next owners will want to preserve those marks forever like you were doing.

And, well, maybe getting in and out of the master bath is a bit awkward because the door sticks, but if you just give it a tiny kick, it opens just fine. Yes, those stains on the carpet are a tad unsightly, but—hey, it was New Year’s Eve of 2000 and Auntie Em thought the world was about to end when the clock struck midnight, so she was chugging the grape juice. And when the countdown ended and the neighbor shot off his gun…yeah, maybe that’s not as cute now that 2012 is approaching and Auntie Em likes prune juice.

So your house has some quirks that not every prospective owner is going to love…some might even hate them. What do you do? You clean it up. And since you have a hard time with destroying the evidence of some of your best memories, maybe an objective opinion is called for.

You wouldn’t consider selling your house without cleaning it up and having a third party (AKA your realtor) evaluate what you still need to do to show it off successfully, right?

So why would you consider doing anything less for that story you’ve been sweating over for the past several months or even years?

You’ve built your world, met your characters, introduced them to the world, added in a plot so they have tasks to accomplish. You’ve given then a voice and shown them participating in activities that lead to other activities. You’ve crafted a heart-stopping climax and finished with a breathtaking flourish. You’re ready to submit to a publisher and take that bow into the world of publication, right?

Wrong.

No one tells the perfect tale in a flawless fashion. We’re all human – more human than the characters we’ve created, actually. We’re bound to miss a period or a set of quotation marks. We probably have too many commas or a misplaced modifier. We may even…gasp! We might have a plot hole or two.

So, your story isn’t 100%. What do you do? You can send it in and risk rejection before the acquisitions editor reads past the second or third page. Or you can polish it.

Oh, you’ve already polished it? What about page 17, where your character said she hasn’t been home in 10 years, and then on page 24, she says she’s been away for 11 years?

It’s easy to miss the small details by being too close to the story you wrote. And it’s those small details the reader is going to notice and say, “Wait a minute!” 

So after you realize you’ve done as much as you can with the story, what do you do? You call a realtor. Or at least a critique partner or a group of them. You need someone to look over your work. Someone who will be able to look at what you’ve crafted with a…well, a critical eye. An objective party. Not the spouse, who will either joke your story’s foibles away or not get it. Not your best friend who will gush about your work because, well, you wrote a book!

You need someone with strong grammar and usage skills, someone who understands fiction and how it’s written. The best critique partners are other authors—this also gives you a chance to critique their work for them to return the favor. Trust me, every time you critique someone else’s work, you will learn also.

Now, I’ve developed a partnership of trust and fun with my critique partners. When they point things out, they’re not trying to undermine me or say my work stinks. They’re giving me insights that I can’t have about my work because I’ve been looking at these pages for so long I overlook things. They’re helping me improve and become a better writer.

But that doesn’t mean we don’t have fun at it. My Achilles heel is the difference between lay and lie. I even tried to teach myself to remember the difference by remembering that chickens lay and people lie. But I frequently miss it because it’s one of those things I grew up with: “The shirt was laying on the floor.” It’s a family colloquialism.

So, what do my crit partners do? They cluck-cluck like chickens whenever they find I’ve done this. We have fun with it because writing fiction, through all its processes, should be fun. Otherwise, why do it?

I trust my crit partners with my baby. I may or may not agree with everything they tell me, but the things they find are things at least I am made aware of. Sometimes, I don’t agree with them and yet I can see I’m not right either, and at such times, critique partners are great persons to brainstorm with. “Obviously plan A isn’t working, so what do you think might fix it?”

As a writer, you owe it to yourself and to the story you’ve been working so hard on, to include crit partners in the process. They are your first line of editing so you can present the most polished manuscript possible to the publisher. And believe me, if you can’t take what a trusted critique partner says without folding, you will have problems when your book goes into the publisher’s editing stage. A crit partner will help you polish your work for the editor to prepare for publication. An editor, on the other hand, has a job to do, and that is to spin your work into gold for your readers to enjoy to the fullest possible extent. The more polished your submission, the easier the process of editing will go.

If you need further convincing about the benefits of a critique partner, consider this personal story. Based on my tag line and brief synopsis, I was invited to a chat pitch with a major publishing house’s top editor. I became finger-tied (the equivalent of tongue-tied) and completely bombed the chat. However, this editor obviously sensed my nervousness, and she changed her question tactic. She asked if I had a critique partner or group, and I told her yes. She asked what they thought of the work, and I told her they liked it. She then asked me for a full submission directed to her attention. Why? She confided to me that my pitch was weak but the fact that I worked with critique partners showed a level of professionalism and dedication, and she knew the manuscript would be more polished than if I submitted it with just my own editing. Editors want the submission to be as polished as you can get it, too. Critique partners are your first line of defense to make sure you get that sought after acceptance letter.

Critique partners can be found in various writing groups at http://groups.yahoo.com/ (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RWCcritique/ is one; others can be found using the search function, http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=romance+writing+critique) and at reviewfuse.com. Also, eharlequin.com has a forum in the community tab, where you can reach out to and connect with other writers.

Thanks so much, Kay, for such wonderful information. It is VITAL that you have crit partners to help you with preparing your manuscript. I see book on a daily basis that speak poorly about the author because of errors that could have been avoided. Writing partners will ensure you put your best foot forward.

I hope this was helpful. please check out my post last week on Formatting Your Manuscript and I hope you'll visit my Workshop Wednesday next week:)

WORKSHOP WEDNESDAY

FORMATTING YOUR SUBMISSION

Happy Wednesday! I'm going to start a new series on my blog about cleaning up and polishing your manuscript so that it's 150% ready to submit. I know, I know. I hear you all groaning about how this has been done to death. But I see books on a weekly basis that are in need of more work before the author even thinks of publishing. This includes formatting.

I have yet to see a publishing house that isn't very specific about how they want the manuscript set up. Please take the time to read the requirements and follow the outline requested. This workshop is a basic guide for your document using Word '03, but it gives you an overview of how you want your manuscript to look when you submit it.

STEP 1: Set your font to TIMES NEW ROMAN and your font size to 12. This is an easy to read font and size and it is generally the style that most houses prefer. DO NOT BE TEMPTED TO USE YOUR "SIGNATURE" FONT OR YOUR FAVORITE FONT. This is not about what you like or think looks best. It's what the publisher wants.

STEP 2: Generally, you need to set your margins to 1" TOP-BOTTOM-LEFT-RIGHT. Remember, this is for submissions, not for printing. Your publisher will make the formatting adjustments necessary for that. It's much easier to read and edit your manuscript if it's set up with a 1" margin and nothing fancy. So under the FILE tab, click on PAGE SETUP and then MARGINS and choose 1".

STEP 3: PLEASE! PLEASE! PLEASE! Whatever you do, DON'T space over or tab to indent paragraphs. This is a nightmare to fix when formatting a manuscript for print. Word has several features that will set your first line indent for you. So go to the FORMAT tab and then click on PARAGRAPH.

Once on this screen, you can set up a couple of things. The first is under the INDENT/SPACING Heading. In the section marked INDENTATION go to SPECIAL and change to FIRST LINE. This automatically indents the first line of all new paragraphs when you hit return. Simple and no more formatting issues.The second thing you'll setup here is under the section marked SPACING. Set BEFORE and AFTER to 0 and set your LINE SPACING to DOUBLE. Once your options look like the ones on the left, press the OKAY button.

STEP 4: Depending on where you're planning to submit your book, you  may have to add a HEADER. This is easily done as well. Just go to VIEW and click on HEADER AND FOOTER. Pick the option that best fits what the house is asking you to use. Generally, they want you to include your name, the book title, and page number.

WALLA! You are now ready to type that masterpiece! Please follow these steps or the instructions set out by the house you want to submit your book to. You never get a second chance to make a first impression.

I hope this helped! Now, hop on over to read what my friend Kay Springsteen has to say about crit partners. Click HERE.

~Kim