Monday, February 15, 2010

Manuscript Formatting Part 1: Counting the Words

Manuscript formatting guidelines can be confusing. Some agents suggest using “magic” formulas, but that can cause a misrepresentation of the actual word count.

When everyone used the same font size and style because they typed with actual typewriters, the 250 word per page rule worked fine. However, once word processors came into play, that guideline caused some problems. Here’s an example.

If your novel is written in 12-point Courier and you have 400 pages, with the 250 word per page method, you’d have 100,000 words. However, if you change the size of your font to 10-point, your novel is suddenly only 350 pages long. 350 x 250 = 87,500 words. Strange, considering you haven’t deleted a single word in your novel. Play around with other font styles and your novel will either grow or shrink even more. So, how does this rule actually give an agent any indication how long your work really is? It doesn’t. Which is why it’s now recommended that writers use the word count tool their word processing software supplies.

Come back Wednesday for more manuscript formatting information.

How do you calculate your word count?

16 comments:

  1. If there's noting specific in the guidelines, I use the 250 words per page method. 12 point courier, spacing set to exactly 25.

    P.S. I have an award for you. See my blog for the details.

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  2. Interesting. I've always used 12 point - 10 point hurts my eyes.

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  3. I just go by my word processor's count. Math hurts my brain.

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  4. I've often wondered what guideline and software writers use to do word count with. Quite interesting.

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  5. There's this program on my computer that counts the words for me. But it is really confusing when you look at it that way.

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  6. I just use 12 point, Times New Roman. Can't wait to read what other guidelines you can give us.

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  7. I type in 12 point, Times New Roman and use the number Word tells me to use for word count.

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  8. I have to say I only use a word processor word-count tool. There is no estimation or any chance of calculation errors, regardless of what font, line spacing, margins etc. that you use.

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  9. I tend to let Word tell me how many words I use. Typically though, I use 12pt font in times or courier and the average is 300ish words per page.

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  10. The rule of thumb these days is go by your computer word count. Due to changing technology, agents and editors go by the what the computer says.
    Just heard an agent speak on Saturday from the Knight Agency and she spoke about this very thing. :)

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  11. The old 250 words per/page rule is obsolete. I always depend on electronic counts. Because I write in Scrivener, I use the Scrivener count as a guideline. It's usually a few words more than MS Word calculates. Since most partial/full requests go out in Word format, I use Word for a final count since that's what the agent will see.

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  12. Great post, Lynette. Myself, I use word count to determine if my ms is the right length for the age group. (I write for kids).

    Usually that works fine, but I did have one editor tell me my ms should be closer to XXX pages. I pulled word count info from similar books to show that I was right in the ballpark--and I changed my font from Times NR to Courier and picked up about 40 pages!! Word count is the only objective gauge, in my opinion.

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  13. Thank heavens for that little Word doc counter thingy. Makes it so much easier.

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  14. Like you, I've heard most publishers use the actual word count, so that's what I do.

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  15. Glad to see most of you are already following the newest trends in publishing. Keep it up!

    Lynnette Labelle

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  16. Interesting. I've heard of the 250 words per page rule but never used it when submitting. I use Word and rely on it for word count.

    But, I have heard that this is not reliable. I don't see any other way to do it though.

    Cher Green

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