Submitting a manuscript, be it a short story or article to a magazine, or a tome to a publisher, is a lot like cooking pasta: It's easy so long as you follow the rules.

1. Appearances count. Double spaced, on one side of the page only, with 1-inch margins, and with your name and address in the upper left-hand corner of the first page (title and byline centered mid-way down). The remaining pages should have a header flush right with your name, story title, and page number (manuscripts do sometimes get dropped). The printout should be crisp, with the type BLACK against white paper. A printer ribbon that is dead enough to produce gray copy should be put out of its misery, as should the cartridge of an inkjet printer that leaves streaks or white lines. If your laser printer prints black vertical lines, replace the drum. Editors spend hours every day reading, and anything that makes this task more difficult will prejudice them against you.
   
   
2. Package the manuscript properly. If it is a short-short, or a single poem, you can get away with a standard business envelope. A manuscript longer than a couple of pages should be sent in a plain, unpadded 9 by 12 inch envelope - it will lay flat when the editor reads it. Manuscripts that try to fold up on themselves because they have spent a week crammed into a business envelope are extremely frustrating. Do NOT use a binder, and do NOT staple the manuscript - clip the pages together with a large paper clip. If you are sending a book to a publisher or an agent, it should be put into a manuscript box (available from office supply stores). Again, do not bind the manuscript in any way.
   
   
3. Mail the manuscript correctly. First class mail or printed matter if you're sending a story to a magazine. Fed-Ex or UPS to send a book to a publisher. Priority this-that-or-the-other will simply cost you more money. Do NOT send the manuscript registered, certified, or anything else that requires a signature. Having to go pick something up at the Post Office is a drag, and you don't want your editor peeved at you.
   
   
4. Include a self-addressed stamped envelope. Magazines receive hundreds to thousands of submissions every month, depending on their size, and the cost of replying to all those authors would rapidly bankrupt them if they had to pay for it. This is especially true for the smaller fiction magazines. If you are submitting to an overseas publisher include an international reply coupon (available at the Post Office) or, if you know someone living in the country, have stamps sent to you (this is much cheaper).
   
   
5. Cover letter? With a short story, only if you must. Don't include a summary of the story, or say what's so good about it - you'll merely ruin the suspense. Don't tell about awards you've won unless they're the sort that will make the editor sit up and take notice (say a Hugo for best Science Fiction story of the year). Don't warn the editor that the story is protected by copyright (she knows that) or mention lawyers - she'll simply return the ms unread for fear of a lawsuit. Do tell her if there is something particular about the rights you are offering. Editors usually assume they are being offered first serial rights. For non-fiction and books, a cover letter is more important. In particular, use it to say what makes you qualified to write the piece in hand (you're a chopper pilot for a mountain rescue unit writing about how you pluck climbers from the jaws of death, for example).
   
   
6. Mail the Manuscript and get working on your next project.

Well, that's it. There is one more question, one which puts editors and writers at loggerheads: Simultaneous Submissions. Most editors will refuse to even consider a manuscript that is being looked at somewhere else. "Why," they ask, "should we waste our time on something someone else might buy?" This is fine if their response times are acceptable. At Worlds of Fantasy & Horror we try to respond within two weeks with a personalized letter if we are not interested in the story. What to say, on the other hand, about a friend of mine who waited two years while the editors of a major SF publisher took time off to have children? When one of the editors got pregnant again and the other pleaded for more time because she did like the story, but she was so overworked, my friend got disgusted and demanded the return of the manuscript. The bottom line, I think, and I do edit, is that a publisher who replies quickly deserves to see the manuscript on an exclusive basis. On the other hand, if you are submitting to markets that take months to reply, submit simultaneously without informing the editors. If one of them buys it, simply inform the others that you are withdrawing the manuscript from their consideration. One thing: if two editors offer to buy the manuscript, don't try to play them off each other. Simply pick the best offer and drop a note to the other saying the piece is no longer available.

© Kyle Phillips, 1996. Like what you read? Find out more about me.

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