Blasted format question help?

[meg_evonne]

query and 15 pages... why can't the blasted thing drop in consistently. Some of it is single space, some of it is double space with absolutely no rhyme or reason? What do you think I'm doing? Suggestions?

Query isn't the problem. I used the copy and paste from the manuscript, does contr c/v work better? Frustrating thing is I emailed it from gmail to my yahoo and it worked decently, not perfect but acceptable, but when I opened the yahoo on a different computer it went ape-sh**...  And yes, it's from PC not Mac. I've heard that Macs never have that problem.

This is the reason that I don't send anything into Ms Snark's First Victim anymore...  I can't stand that it doesn't arrive as neat and clean as I sent.  Plus, it then makes me worry about other query submissions. One reason I haven't done this for a year or more. So much easier to just keep it all to myself.

And a huge thank you in advance if you think you know what I'm doing. As a test, i'd be glad to email to you and you can report back how horrid it looks.

[Shecky]

Are you talking about copying the text into the body of an e-mail? Never really a good idea unless you and the recipient are both on the same platform (I have a PC at home and a Mac at work, and I can attest that Macs do have weird auto-reformatting issues just the same) using the same email service on the same browser. Same goes for sending a separately attached document (need to have the same word-processing program, same edition and same platform to be almost completely sure to prevent auto-reformatting nonsense). In truth, I'd actually recommend Google Docs, to be honest; it seems to hold up across those potential incompatibility-wracked problem-inducers.

[meg_evonne]

Ahh, I'll try Google Docs and see if that clears it up.

And yes, they never want an attachment of any kind, so it's the query followed by five or 15 or 50 pages--whatever they request. I certainly don't want to take the time to re-type that many pages and I'd just mess it up anyway. The times that I did type it in, they still didn't arrive at another location properly. So Google Docs it is--I hope.

Thanks Shecky!

[Gruud]

Honestly, IMO your very safest bet is to take whatever you want to send, copy it out of Word (or whatever), using either right-click, copy or CTRL+C, and paste it (right-click, paste or CTRL+V) into Notepad.

That will give you a completely unformatted document.

Then, just so you know exactly what you're working with, turn "Word Wrap" off.

Each of those incredibly long lines that you see will be a paragraph. Separate each line with a retrun to get a blank line between each paragraph. Notepad will respect carriage retruns, but don't try to use tabs to fake in paragraph indents or it will drive you crazy.

Now that you've got a bunch of long lines of text separated by blank lines, turn "Word Wrap" back on so you can see what you have.

Once you're happy with that, hit CTRL+A to select it all, CTRL+C to copy it, and then CTRL+V to paste it into any outbound email that you have prepared.

Send it to your own email addresses first (I'd recommend looking at at least two or three), just so you can get a good look.

Notice that the paragraphs should size properly to any email reading format that you open it in. It will do especially well in Outlook, as it will resize on the fly as you resize the window. It should also look fine posted into any web reading format ... like one of these posting windows, for example.

That shoud do it. Let me know how it goes?

[Shecky]

Ahh, I'll try Google Docs and see if that clears it up.

And yes, they never want an attachment of any kind, so it's the query followed by five or 15 or 50 pages--whatever they request. I certainly don't want to take the time to re-type that many pages and I'd just mess it up anyway. The times that I did type it in, they still didn't arrive at another location properly. So Google Docs it is--I hope.

Thanks Shecky!

One other option: if you and the recipient both have the capacity to insert/read in-message images, try doing it as a PDF. Horribly bulky, but it's absolutely accurate.

[Starbeam]

One other option: if you and the recipient both have the capacity to insert/read in-message images, try doing it as a PDF. Horribly bulky, but it's absolutely accurate.

I'm not positive, but I think that would be considered an attachment.  Best thing would be to fix formatting in a text file, and copy paste from there.  Otherwise there will be formatting issues of some kind, no matter what.

If anything, I'd say it'd be best to ask agents/editors if they have suggestions on what might work best, or if format problems are that big an issue.

[meg_evonne]

Thanks everyone!

OK, I'm still getting my non-tech mind around your suggestions Gruud. I will need to play with that. It's the Control A and the 'word wrap' bit that is completely new to me. I'm thinking 'word wrap' is my culprit.

In the meantime, I experimented yesterday and this morning. The least impacted was the Control C/V from Gdocs and sent via GMail. So it will go as it goes. If it wasn't meant to be this time, so be it.

I will however work diligently before sending it off to a small list of agents. If I spent the blasted time getting it all ready, it's a shame not to keep sending for a bit.  The Hamlet YA is pulling me and I've abandoned a writing pal...  And I'm now researching ice caves in Renier... and that is far more fascinating and fun. 

[Gruud]

Word Wrap is found under the Format pulldown in Notepad.

CTRL+A only selects all the text in the doc. You can just as easily select it all with your mouse, if that's what you're used to.

Let me know if you'd like additional explanations. 

Good luck!

[Starbeam]

Thanks everyone!

OK, I'm still getting my non-tech mind around your suggestions Gruud. I will need to play with that. It's the Control A and the 'word wrap' bit that is completely new to me. I'm thinking 'word wrap' is my culprit.

In the meantime, I experimented yesterday and this morning. The least impacted was the Control C/V from Gdocs and sent via GMail. So it will go as it goes. If it wasn't meant to be this time, so be it.

I will however work diligently before sending it off to a small list of agents. If I spent the blasted time getting it all ready, it's a shame not to keep sending for a bit.  The Hamlet YA is pulling me and I've abandoned a writing pal...  And I'm now researching ice caves in Renier... and that is far more fascinating and fun. 

Word wrap is what automatically moves a word to the next line if it would've been hyphenated.  And actually, it might be worth it to try the Scrivener beta, if you don't already have the program, because the compile options for that actually have formatting options like hyphenation, lines for bold/italic/etc, and all that stuff.  I haven't tried it for emailing, but have for converting to .rtf and printing. 

Another option to try is changing from left justification to left/right so that the margins are the same with no white space from long words.  Not quite sure if Word works the same as Pages, but this might actually be the easiest option.