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STYLE SHEET FOR
SUBMISSION OF ARTICLES, CHAPTERS, BOOKS SUBMISSION
OF BOOKS CHAPTERS/ARTICLES
Midnight Marquee
has launched the writing of many of today's most well-known
genre writers. We are always looking for new talent,
but if you think you'll get rich writing, think again,
you have to write because you love to write, not for
money.
We can accept any format CD or
DVD for the Macintosh (preferred) or PC. We ask that
contributors send us a hard copy as well as a computer
disk (clearly labeled). Authors frequently send us
updates of books before layout begins. This is fine.
We only ask that each disk/attachment is clearly labeled
and dated (so we accidentally do not use an older
version of the manuscript).
SENDING CHAPTERS AS ATTACHED
E-MAIL FILES We us MacLinksPlus, a software program
that allows us to decode and translate all manuscripts
sent us as attached files via e-mail or on disk. Most
of these transmissions are successful. We do ask that
you also submit a hard copy via regular mail and followup
a few day's after submission to see if the transmission
was successful. Never send chapters or articles as
a regular e-mail (using cut and paste), as all formatting
(italics, bold) is lost. Always send copy as an e-mail
attachment in the original software program in which
it was created (Microsoft Word, Word Perfect, etc.).
GENERAL INFORMATION FOR SUBMITTING
MANUSCRIPTS
1. When using dashes in your
text, do not type "--" or " - ";
instead, use an Em Dash. Your word processing program
should show you how to create them. Thus, this is
the proper format: "Bela Lugosi—on the comeback
in Son of Frankenstein—reminded his fans
of the great talent he was." Do not place a space
before or after the Em Dash.
2. When using an ellipsis in
your text, do not put any space between the three
periods. Do not use a space between the ellipsis and
the last or first letter when the ellipsis comes at
the end or beginning of a sentence. Thus, this is
wrong: "when Jack and Fred . . ." This is
also wrong: "when Jack and Fred ... come alive
in the last reel." This is correct: "when
Jack and Fred...come alive." Notice, no space
between "Fred" and the dots, or no space
after the dots before the word "come."
3. Cast and Credits lists should
always appear at the end of the chapter or article,
never at the beginning. The format to be used is below
(notice the lack of indentation, placing the word
Credits and Cast in all caps, using colons and parentheses,
having the star's real name come before the character
name).
CREDITS: Producer: Michael Balcon;
Director: Robert Stevenson; Screenplay: L. Du Garde
Peach and Sidney Gilliat; Cinematographer: Jack Cox;
Editors: R.E. Dearing (notice there is no space between
2 initials)
CAST: Boris Karloff (Dr. Laurience);
Anna Lee (Dr. Clare Wyatt); John Loder (Dick);
4. Never set your margins wider
than 6 1/2 inches. 5. Set your paragraph indents at
one-quarter inch (use a tab stop; do not space manually
by hitting the space bar).
5. Send us type that is single-spaced
(if you send it double we have to reformat your text
and this adds time).
6. Do not print out page numbers
or any type of header or footer on your copy.
7. Do not use any special formatting
gimmicks that your word processor uses such as forcing
text to fit on one page or a specific "leading"
measurement that sets the spacing between lines. The
more fancy formatting you use, the more complex it
is for us to de-format your text. Often we can't!
8. Always use Times or Times
Roman as your submission font.
9. Remember to place titles of
movies, plays, TV shows, novels, etc. in italics using
upper and lower case letters (never all capitals).
Do not place the above in bold!
10. Place song titles, individual
episodes of a TV show, etc. in quotes.
11. Do not overdo synopses. We
are looking for personal analysis (tracing themes,
directorial style, sequences that work/don't work),
production details, etc. Readers want to hear your
opinions! However, reminding your reader of the overall
plot or specific sequences is often helpful. Balance
is the key.
12. Do not spend too much time
quoting what other critics/genre writers have said
about your movie. A little of this goes a long way.
When quoting it is better to use major sources (Variety,
New York Times, etc.). Keep this to a minimum.
13. Bob, Fred and Ted: we now
drop that final comma before "and" in a
list of three.
14. We follow the style rule that
capitalizes the first letter after a colon, if what
follows can stand alone as a complete sentence. Example—According
to Gary Svehla: Horror films are adult fairy tales
(not: horror movies are adult fairy tales).
15. When sending back proofread
copy, please mark the copy in red or black pen and
make any changes big, bold, and noticeable. Always
draw a line to the right or left hand border (or put
an "X" in the border) to alert us that a
change has been made within the body of the text copy.
Never ever use Wite-Out to make proof changes!
16. Too many writers like to use
little slang terms that they put into quotes. Please,
don't! Don't do this: Dick Tracy "flattens"
the "flunky" with a good "right"
to the "noodle." Instead: Dick Tracy flattens
the flunky with a good right to the noodle.
17. Create a sense of "writer's
voice" that reflects your personality in whatever
you write. Avoid a dry, academic tone. Avoid using
words found in the Thesaurus: Do not write down to
the reader, but communicate clearly and succinctly.
18. Always try to reinvent yourself
by changing your writing style and approaching chapters
with new eyes and insight.
19. Avoid footnotes like the plague.
If they are necessary, put them at the end of the
chapter (not at the bottom of every page) and keep
them to a minimum. Academic writing is often boring
writing.
20. When including long quoted
passages (4 or more sentences), skip a line and indent
(1/2 inch, both right and left margins) to separate
these longer quoted sections from the rest of the
text. Skip a line before continuing with regular text.
Do not put these indented quote sections in quotes.
And always identify your sources.
21. Numbers one-nine spell out;
10, 11, 12, etc. 22 us number keys.
22. Many writers send us text
where tab stops are embedded into the text every half
inch or so. This makes things difficult for us to
reformat your text. Thus, I'd like to see a tab stop
for paragraphs and perhaps two for indented quotes
(#20 above), but that is all the tab stops I need
see. Remember the more formatting in your text, the
more difficult it is for me to reformat your text
to meet the needs of our layout.
23. Article length: Articles for
Midnight Marquee should be submitted single-spaced
and should be typed in 12 point. The length of the
article should be 7-10 pages in length. If your article
has needs that go beyond this length, approval with
the editor on a case by case basis is required.
24. If you are submitting a manuscript
to be published as a book, the length should be 200-225
single-spaced text, set in 12 point text. Longer manuscripts
can be accepted on a case by case basis, but any text
longer than 250 pages in manuscript format can be
problematic
. 25. It is always helpful if
the writer can provide photos, pressbooks, etc. to
help illustrate the article, chapter or book. We have
passed on publishing some well written manuscripts
simply because we were not able to acquire enough
graphics to illustrate the manuscript.
26. Because of corruption of files
resulting in Midnight Marquee having to lay out manuscripts
twice, we no longer accept scanned photos from outside
sources. The author either allows us to borrow to
scan and to return the original photos or ads, or,
the author, at his or her own expense, pays for color
copies to be sent us. We are very responsible with
loaned materials, and our printer requires materials
to be scanned in a very specific manner that makes
the graphics look best when published, and we need
to scan all materials in this specific manner. No
exceptions!
27. When sending us a manuscript,
it is always helpful that the author caption all photos,
ads, graphics submitted and clearly label all graphics
so no confusion exists where the caption goes.
28. Once a manuscript is submitted
in final draft format, we may not be able to alter
text or layout if, miraculously, some interview or
graphic material becomes available at the last moment.
Final submission means final submission. So please
be sure what you send is actually a final submission.
SOME ADDITIONAL POINTERS FROM
OUR COPY EDITOR, LINDA J. WALTER
29. Get a recent dictionary such
as Webster's Tenth College Edition, and a good style
book (such as The Chicago Manual of Style) or The
Elements of Style. Look things up that you've always
been a bit unsure of! You want to be as professional
as possible right off the bat.
30. Be sure to read your article for sense when it's
done. Have a literate friend read it, and see if s/he
understands everything. Some authors use extremely
obscure words and that slows the usual reader down.
It's okay to be creative and use uncommon words sometimes,
but some writers sprinkle lots of foreign terms and
extremely arcane words or phrases in there, and meaning
can be lost. Remember to think of your audience!
31. Do not use very many exclamation points!!!!!!
Seriously, most nonfiction writing uses them sparingly,
but some authors greatly overuse them; I've often
changed them where not needed. Exclamations are used
for points that are very important to make, or a thought
that evokes amusement or wonderment.
32. Be sure each sentence is a complete thought. This
sounds so obvious, but sometimes there are lapses
(could be computer-driven deletes that are mistakes,
or just lost thoughts).
33. Do not overuse commas. Some writers use commas
approximately every 3-6 words, and thus have lengthy,
never-ending, run-on sentences, like this one, that
really, really, makes a sentence, such as this one,
quite choppy. Break it up. Throw some short ones in
there. Make it more snappy and less long-winded. A
writer should attempt to create rhythm by varying
longer sentences with medium-range sentences with
short sentences. Mix it up!
34. Use your machine's spell check before you submit
the work. Any words that spell check doesn't know
and you don't know either, look up.
35. After you're finished and let it sit for at least
a few hours or overnight, reread for consistency.
Say you're writing about "Some Like It Hot." Then
half the time, a writer will write "Some like it Hot"
or other variations on capitalization. Pick one (hopefully
the title written as you'd see it most often in other
reputable publication) and stay with it! Same with
titles of things like newspapers: The New York Times
or The New York Times. Time magazine. Things like
that. Check online style guides or written ones. Same
with names... sometimes writers use "van Sloan" and
later "Van Sloan," but in the middle of a sentence,
not just at the beginning. The more consistent, the
easier to edit, proof and get it printed as you envision
the piece (as long as it's well-written and conforms
to MidMar style).
36. Learn when to use hyphens, en dashes, and em dashes.
There are specific times for each; find out how to
make them on your computer, as discussed by Gary and
Sue earlier. Hyphenate compound-word adjectives ("It's
a well-written book,") but not when they're used in
the reverse form ("The book was well written.") I
know it's confusing, but this is our general style
system in the United States.
37. Be consistent in style for abbreviations and items
with numerals, and whatever else could be written
more than one way. For instance, it's common to use
periods in such terms as U.S. (and not US, for our
country), L.A. (for Los Angeles), U.K., U.S.S.R.,
and Roman numerals for World War I or II or WWII.
Also, it's usual to write out United States when referring
to it as a noun, but you can use U.S. as an adjective,
as in "The U.S. flag was flying." Here is a list of
words commonly used in articles, chapters and books
submitted to us. Here is what we consider to be the
consistent spelling: makeup (no hyphen), backstage,
onscreen, onstage, backlot, screenwriter, sci-fi,
coauthor, costar, filmmaker, filmmaking.
38. For adverbs ending in "ly," do not put a hyphen
before them. Wrong: "It is a beautifully-written script."
Right: "It is a beautifully written script." Many
people still get this wrong even in published writing,
but it's a hard and fast copyediting rule.
39. American style puts periods and commas inside
quotation marks, even if not a whole sentence or at
the end of a sentence. "She went to the movies," he
said. Not: "She went to the movies", he said. The
British do it the other way (and sometimes use only
single quotes, but we aren't Brits, and our British
writers should Americanize their writing for U.S.
audiences, as much as possible!).
40. When referring to people even by their function,
use "who" or "whom," not "that." For example, it's
"The actor who played the role," not "The actor that
played the role." 41. Do not use "I wanted to try
and fix it." The correct usage is "I wanted to try
to fix it." The form "try and" is just wrong.
42. Know the difference between "it's" (a contraction
of "it is,") and "its" (a possessive pronoun, just
like his and hers). Too many people write "it's" all
the time, for both. "The dog chased it's tail" is
incorrect; use its.
43. Also, most plurals do not have apostrophes, they
just have an "s" (or an "es"; if unsure, check dictionary).
This is rampant everywhere in society. It's not "Eat's
and Drink's" but "Eats and Drinks"! You'll see signs
that people are selling "plum's" or "television's."
Wrong!
Gary and Susan Svehla 9721 Britinay
Lane Baltimore, MD 21234 phone: 410-665-1198 e-mail:
mmarquee@aol.com
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