Fastening pages together?
- Thread starter Lapinou
- Start date
I'd read never to staple them, but the article I read didn't specify whether to fasten them together any other way or not. It just said 'when it comes to fastening MS pages together, never staple them'.
What do you do when it comes to 40 page partials? Or even full MSs?
What do you do when it comes to 40 page partials? Or even full MSs?
40-page partials can still be held together by a large paper clip.
For full manuscripts, I used giant rubber bands. You can usually get them in office supply stores.
For full manuscripts, I used giant rubber bands. You can usually get them in office supply stores.
And for future reference, don't over package a submission. For a full manuscript just wrap it neatly with paper (similar to how copy paper comes packaged), put rubber bands around it, and put it in a box. Don't use bubble wrap and tape it all together and put it in a smaller box and put more bubble wrap around that, etc, etc.
Even rubber bands are unnecessary. For larger manuscripts, loose pages neatly inside a box of proper size is enough.* The easier it is for an agent to handle the pages, the better.
*The exception being movie/TV scripts, which have their own preferred, and fairly rigid, submission format.
*The exception being movie/TV scripts, which have their own preferred, and fairly rigid, submission format.
You can use large alligator clips, too, or a (non-binder) file jacket. Anything that keeps the pages neat without sticking them together, basically.
Rubber bands aren't really that complicated to use.
And there's nothing worse than opening up a loose manuscript and something going wrong (butterfingers!) so all those loose, unbound pages go flying....
Yes. In the US, screenplays are three-hole punched, but only two brads are used, never three. And the color of the cover signifies what version of the screenplay the script is.
- Joined
- Aug 24, 2007
- Messages
- 8,049
- Reaction score
- 772
- Location
- Clearlake Park, CA
- Website
- www.strokingthepen.com
You could invite all the neighborhood kids over and have a bubble popping party.There goes my closet full of bubble wrap!
Rubber bands aren't really that complicated to use.
And there's nothing worse than opening up a loose manuscript and something going wrong (butterfingers!) so all those loose, unbound pages go flying....
I edit a lot of technical scientific material, some of it book-sized. I've never ever dropped anything. If I ever do, then that's my fault, not the fault of the manuscript sender. And, of course, you should always have page numbers, so things can be reassembled in the highly unlikely event anything of that sort ever happens.
Which is more likely to happen if you have to lift the entire damn manuscript out of the box in order to take the damn rubber bands off it. Really. Loose-leaf stacks of papers neatly fenced within a standard size box are far the easiest to handle for an editor. You read a page at a time from the bottom part of the box, and turn it over into the upper part.
I can honestly say I have no idea how the agents who received my rubber-band-bound manuscripts read or dealt with that pesky rubber band.
All I know for sure is that whenever my editor sends a bound, edited manuscript back, it's got at least one, sometimes two, rubber bands holding it together. So some industry folks do use them.
All I know for sure is that whenever my editor sends a bound, edited manuscript back, it's got at least one, sometimes two, rubber bands holding it together. So some industry folks do use them.
All I know for sure is that whenever my editor sends a bound, edited manuscript back, it's got at least one, sometimes two, rubber bands holding it together. So some industry folks do use them.
As I have never experienced this event, nor ever expect to, I'll defer to your observation on the matter.
Jennifer_Laughran
knows what she's looking for when she finds it!
Absolute Sage
Super Member
Registered
I thank god rarely have to deal with paper. But when I do, I generally prefer a rubber band in a regular padded envelope. Box, schmox.