Authored by Cheyenne Clenney, UNG Press Intern
Frequent spelling, punctuation, and grammar errors are to be expected when an editor begins the process of revising a manuscript. To ensure the revisions are consistent and cohesive throughout, an official set of guidelines is essential. Style guides are the rulebooks of style, usage, and grammar to be followed when writing and editing.
The Purpose of a Style Guide
Style guides vary across different fields and—in the case of book publishing—specific publishers. The U.S. publishing industry relies primarily on the Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS), but there are other standard guides used by different disciplines, such as the Modern Language Association (MLA), the American Psychological Association (APA), and the Associated Press (AP) (Howe).
When a press or publishing house deviates from the standard style guide, an in-house style guide is created to track these changes (Howe). The in-house style guide ensures these minimal, supplementary changes are applied to all the press’ documents.
Similarly, an author doesn’t always have to follow every one of the standard rules of style and grammar, but when they don’t, it must be consistent. That is where style sheets come in.
The Role of a Style Sheet
Style sheets differ from style guides because they are not specific to the press; they are specific to the manuscript. Style sheets are a reference tool to indicate the authors’ own style, listing choices like character and place spellings, hyphenation preferences, abbreviations, and numbers (Midnight Editors).
Editors create and use style sheets to assist them in the editing process, and the sheet travels from line editor to copyeditor to proofreader to enforce the same decisions each pass (Midnight Editors). Because they are manuscript-specific, they can be formatted as bullet points, charts, alphabetized lists—any layout the editor prefers.
Why Are Style Guides and Style Sheets Important?
As a book goes through the entire publishing process, consistency is key.
Style sheets keep the editor organized and efficient. It is easy to forget if the author italicized a term on page 6 because the editor didn’t expect it to show up a hundred pages later. A quick look at their handy style sheet, and they know the author’s preferred formatting.
In trade book publishing, the CMOS offers guidance on everything from serial commas to title and copyright pages. It is beneficial for authors to have this knowledge easily accessible to them as they prepare a manuscript for submission, but editors will revise and reformat anything they may have overlooked according to standard guidelines.
The usage of style sheets and style guides is the same regardless of field, publishing house, or editing stage; they are both effective referencing tools that ensure clear, coherent writing.
References
Howe, Rachel. “Style Guide, Style Sheet—What’s the Difference?” Ooligan Press, April 2022, https://www.ooliganpress.com/style-guide-style-sheet/.
Midnight Editors. “Why Book Publishing Runs on The Chicago Manual of Style (and How Your Editor Uses It).” Midnight Editors, https://midnighteditors.com/chicago-manual-of-style/.
Leave a Reply