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Format for texting?

gtanders

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What do you guys do to format texting conversations in your stories? I've been using italic on a new line:

Fingers shaking, she texted Jonas.

Just paranoia.

When I change this to old-school, Courier New, underline instead of italic, it looks weird:

Fingers shaking, she texted Jonas.

Just paranoia.



I've seen some people do italics set off with < >.

What do you guys think?
 

mrsmig

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Choose whatever you want, but be consistent about it. If you sell the story, the publisher will no doubt have their own house style and will re-format accordingly.
 

indianroads

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Are you self publishing, or going through an agent / publishing house?

As mrsmig said - be consistent. If you're self publishing though, this decision is solely yours and there are a lot of ways to go.

ETA: The first thing that came to mind for me was a simple change of font - to courier from whatever you're using for the rest of your novel. Courier looks like something off a typewriter, so that's why I'd use it.
 
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Chase

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Good advice above.

Weird or not, in a manuscript, Just paranoia in Times New Roman means exactly the same thing as Just paranoia in Courier New.
 
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Enlightened

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In one of the Brandon Sanderson videos, a well-respected author who teaches SFF novel writing at BYU, noted to be careful adding catchphrases to your writing. Who knows if texting will be a thing in 5 or 10 years. Will tweets/Twitter be around? Will desktop computers be around in another ten years?

I think texting is one of these words. Might want to add dialogue as generic as possible. "Let me send her a message."
 

blackcat777

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I read something recently where all the texts were simply italicized and the only thing that struck me, as an author, was how smoothly the texted bits of story flowed. I don't like underlining, but then, I don't like ketchup either, so YMMV. ;)
 

Chase

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In one of the Brandon Sanderson videos, a well-respected author who teaches SFF novel writing at BYU, noted to be careful adding catchphrases to your writing. Who knows if texting will be a thing in 5 or 10 years. Will tweets/Twitter be around? Will desktop computers be around in another ten years?

In general, I agree agree with Sanderson about avoiding dated terms in novels. However, my books take place at specific historic times, and terms of the times are often necessary for understanding (for instance flip phones and early ten-key texting as boons to deaf communications).

I read something recently where all the texts were simply italicized and the only thing that struck me, as an author, was how smoothly the texted bits of story flowed. I don't like underlining, but then, I don't like ketchup either, so YMMV. ;)

I also agree with italics to indicate silent texts (as well as its few other indications).

Again, in manuscripts, underlining in certain fonts tells printers to change the words to italics. It's a remnant left over from typewritten manuscripts before computers where underlines mean book titles, names of ships, etc. :greenie
 

Enlightened

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In general, I agree agree with Sanderson about avoiding dated terms in novels. However, my books take place at specific historic times, and terms of the times are often necessary for understanding (for instance flip phones and early ten-key texting as boons to deaf communications).

I still use a cheap flip phone (instead of a smart phone). It serves my purposes and is cheaper. My instinct, fro your example, is to use other tells of history changes (rather than dated or obsolete tech).