Contest Entry Manuscript Format Information

Contest Entry Manuscript Format

	Your primary goal should be to make things as easy as possible for the contest 

judges. The cardinal rule of contest manuscript formatting is to do everything in your

power to avoid annoying the judges, who are a cantankerous lot anyway, thanks to all the

poorly formatted contest manuscripts they must read.

DO NOT use fancy fonts.

DO NOT use colored ink.

DO NOT use colored paper.

DO NOT single-space the lines.

DO NOT justify the right margin.

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Use a nonproportional or monospaced font such as Courier (12-point) or Courier New
 
(12-point). ("Nonproportional" or "monospaced" means that each letter should take up 

the same space, whether it's an i or a w, an l or an m, just like you're using a 

typewriter.) This document is in 12-point Courier. While creating your story you can

    use whatever font style and size you desire, but when it comes to printing out the

    final version to enter in the contest, please use Courier or Courier New 12-point.

Use black ink on white, 8 1/2 inch X 11 inch standard paper only. (Foreign contestants 

may use different size paper if that is all they have available.)

Double-spaced lines--the judges may need room to make notations between lines, but not 

too much room, so do not triple-space.

The beginning of every paragraph in your manuscript should be indented five spaces 

(one half inch) from the left margin.  Do not place extra double spaces between 

paragraphs.  The indentation is sufficient to indicate that a new paragraph has begun.

Wide margins (one inch on all four sides).

Justify the text on the left margin only; leave your right margin ragged.

Center three pound signs about an inch apart (#     #     #) between scene breaks. Do 

not triple-space between paragraphs or insert graphics.

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Use single-sided, unstapled pages.
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Cover page: Your name, address, telephone number, e-mail address (if you have one), 

contest name, and story title should appear at the upper left. It is not necessary to

place your Social Security number anywhere on your manuscript.

First page: Half-way down the page place the story title.

Story pages: story title keyword(s) (one or two important words from the story’s title) 

and the current page number on every page at the upper right, for example: 

Contest Format/1, Contest Format/2, etc. The author’s name should not appear on any story 

page. If the unbound pages happen to fall off the judges’ desks and become mixed up with 

other manuscripts, the header helps the judge reassemble yours in the proper order.

Indicate italics like this, with underlines and not by actually switching to italicized 

text.

Word count: If your word processing software doesn't give you a word count, you can 

estimate the total by counting the number of words on one page and multiplying by the 

number of pages in the manuscript. If your manuscript makes it to the final stages of 

winning contest entries, we will do an exact word count. All words count as words, so the

words "a," "an," and "the" count as words. Hyphenated words are counted as one word.

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Kent Brewster in his instructions on book manuscript format very aptly addresses font

    changes:

    Don't do any other font changes. Yes, that means:

    Don't do this.

    Don't do this.

    Don't do this, either.

...don't ever do anything even remotely resembling this! Proportional fonts are very hard to read in manuscript-sized pages; you're getting about twice normal letter density here, and if you single-space, four times. Editors are used to being able to read a certain number of words in a certain amount of time; if you cram four times as many onto a page, they're going to come away with the inevitable impression that your story is s-l-o-w.

	"No, but wait," you say.  "My characters are speaking to each other 

telepathically, or near each other in six different languages, and I need to use several 

typefaces, just to keep everything straight in my own head."

	Bzzzt!  Wrong!  Your characters are trying to tell you--in six telepathic 

languages--that you haven't thought the story through.  The reader has a hard-won sense 

of how these things work...and trying to shove a new standard down their throats won't

work.

	Please go back and figure out a way to tell the story in standard manuscript 

format; on the way, I'll bet you'll find and fix several other problems you may have 

overlooked.

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	These are not hard and fast rules, but remember the cardinal rule of contest 

manuscript formatting, as mentioned at the beginning. The wrong format or font won't 

destroy your chances; it may not even hurt. It a question of whether you're willing to 

take the chance that your writing is good enough to overcome the difficulties you'll 

cause by not doing things as suggested. Follow these guidelines and your work will 

come across as professional. You will have scored points with the judges right away. 

The judges will find reading your crisp, clean, black-and-white manuscript to be 

enjoyable.

Story Tips

Avoid overworked and cliché stories. One example is the "and then I woke up" story, 

which leaves the reader feeling cheated because the reader understands consciously or 

subconsciously that the story was simply a lie or a dream. It's the equivalent of 

saying to someone, "Your mother was just brutally murdered. Gotcha. Just kidding." Not

very satisfying, is it?

Read winning stories from past issues of WRITERS’ Journal. These stories reflect what 

judges consider to be well written and enjoyable.

Profanity and vulgarity are not encouraged. Please try to express the displeasure, 

urgency, surprise, or whatever you are trying to convey in words that would not offend 

the majority of sweet, dear grandmothers--one of whom might be a contest judge.