Joseph Sin - the ms

While I was writing Joseph Sin I used the Trebuchet font, had single-line spacing, and had a line gap between paragraphs with no para indentation.  I was comfortable with that, and it helped me to write.

The first step to getting this ms (ms = abbreviation for manuscript) published is to change the format.  I've checked out a few sites with guidelines on how to prepare an ms for presentation to an agent or publisher.  I've had to give it a more basic font and increase the size of the font, give it double-line spacing, and indent the paragraphs.  I no longer recognise it.  It looks like some kind of 1970's mainframe print-out, the kind that came on green-striped paper.  I felt like I was betraying my child!

I'm usually pretty good at proof-reading, not professionally, but I can read a document and spot most typos and errors.  But with this new, super-sized font I can spot a few more errors.  This means I am going to have to go through the whole thing again to fix things up.  Seeing the writing in a different size and font is also making it a bit easier to see the thing with fresh eyes.  A bit like when you're drawing, and you look at the drawing in a mirror to see things you can no longer see looking directly.  Another reason to work through the book again and see what can be freshened up in the writing.

In its current format the ms has almost 131, 000 words, spread across 615 pages.

Joseph Sin - the manuscript, the quest

Joseph Sin. Not my name, the name of my...well, what shall I call it. 

I can't call it a book, "a written or printed work of fiction or nonfiction, usually on sheets of paper fastened or bound together within covers" (dictionary.com). It isn't bound yet.

I could call it a novel, "a fictitious prose narrative of considerable length and complexity, portraying characters " (dictionary.com). But that sounds a bit pretentious to me: surely it can't be called a novel until it's published.

So, it will have to be a manuscript, "the original text of an author's work, handwritten or now usually typed, that is submitted to a publisher" (dictionary.com).

I'd like to call it a book. I'd like to be able to point at a printed version of "Joseph Sin" and say, 'Look, this my book!' So, this blog is a record of my quest to have Joseph Sin published.