How Do We Write?

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MJE
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by MJE »

Julie2owlsdene wrote:I have always written my stories without indentations.
     Julie, I'm just curious about whether the publisher you are referring to actually asked you to do it that way, or whether you just chose to yourself. From what I know, that is an unusual thing if they asked you to. Did they say why they wanted it without indentations?

Regards, Michael.
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by MJE »

Daisy wrote:I'm not sure as we haven't had the opportunity to see another format. (At least I can't remember if it was ever different.)
     Daisy, both styles are used in different situations. The determining factor is whether you are looking at a page containing just one chapter of a story or a page containing the whole story.
     If you go, for instance, to Julie's "The Rook's Rock Mystery" or Rob's "Five Go off on a Narrowboat", you will see that these are so far appearing only as individual chapters. (Even though the latter is now complete, the full-story version of it doesn't seem to have appeared yet - I assume that's in the works.) You will see that there are no paragraph indentations, and there are empty lines separating all paragraphs. But if you go to one of the older stories - for example, Julie's "Exciting Time for the Secret Seven" - you will see that the individual chapters are still there, but that there is an option at the top for seeing the whole story on one page, and a link provided. If you go there, you will see that the traditional book format is used (indented paragraphs, no separating empty lines). Also, the typeface used is different.
     All this is controlled by the style-sheets I mentioned before. It is not the case that there are two different versions of the actual story documents; the story text in both versions is the same, except for being split into chapters in one version and amalgamated into one long document for the other.
     Another point in favour of the full-story version is that you get a blank screen containing just the story, whereas in the chapter-by-chapter version you still have all the surrounding links, frames, etc.

     When I first looked into all this quite some time ago, I found that there are indeed two different style-sheets controlling these two styles, and anyone curious can see what they look like quite easily.
     The style-sheet that indents paragraphs can be seen here:

  http://enidblytonsociety.co.uk/download-styles.css

- and the one that doesn't can be seen here:

  http://enidblytonsociety.co.uk/styles.css

     The code for the two versions of the text, while containing exactly the same code relating to the text, contains different code at the top, and this contains references to one or other of the above style-sheets.

     If anyone wants to display or print out stories with proper indenting of paragraphs, they can do so even while only individual chapters without indenting are so far displayed on the site, although it takes a minute or two of fiddling around - very easy when you know how, as I am about to tell you.
     First, you make sure you have saved the first of these .css files along with the story documents, and ensure it is in the same subdirectory as the story. (When you save a page, if you save in "web page, complete" format, that will include the style-sheet that has been mentioned in the page, but not the other; if you save as "web page, HTML only", no style-sheet will be saved - just the file containing the story text.)
     Now you have to open the web page file in a text editor such as NotePad, WordPad (Windows), TextEdit (Macintosh), or similar. (I'm sure there is a Linux text editor, too, but I don't know what any such are called.) Note: a *text editor* - NOT a word-processor unless it has a plain-text formatting option.
     Now you go to the 7th line in the file (it may appear to be a bit more due to line-wrapping), where you will see amongst the code this: "styles.css". Just change "styles" there to "download-styles" - ignore the rest of the code. Make sure you keep the lower case of the letters and the immediately following full-stop before the "css".
     Save the file with this change - and now the display of the story will change to the indented style.
     (All the surrounding links and frames, etc. will still be there, although radically changed in style - essentially reduced to a column of text links, with no graphics effects. All that can be easily edited out too, but that is slightly more major surgery, and too involved to explain here.)

Regards, Michael.
Last edited by MJE on 26 Mar 2017, 03:57, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by MJE »

Rob Houghton wrote:The strange layout of my manuscript has to do with the fact it was originally saved in different files - one for each chapter, and then, before I sent it to Nigel to read, I put all those chapters into one file like a proper book.
     Rob, I'm just wondering what this is. Are you talking about your serial now on the web site, or a more recent one yet to appear? (Sorry if it's obvious and most know - but, as I said before, I have been away for a bit and sort of lost track of things. Always seems to happen with me.)
Rob Houghton wrote:The book was originally laid out as per what I'd read in 'how to write' books - of which I've read about 12 or 13 over the years - at least one and a half spaces between lines (this is so a publisher's proof-reader can write changes in the space between the lines) and with indented paragraphs.
     Indented paragraphs - no doubt about that - I think 5 is the standard, and what I use.
     A lot of the "how to write" books actually said double-spacing, or sometimes one-and-a-half at the least. I don't like that much, and don't do it while writing myself; but if I were ever to submit anything, clearly I could make a duplicate copy that had that spacing if it was required - probably quite easy to do with computers now.
     But do publishers still want work submitted on paper anyway, double-spaced and all the rest? I kind of had the idea (but I'm not sure) that you send them a computer file now and they work from that. Do they then print that out for editing, etc.? If so, I guess they could easily do that in the kind of spacing they want.
     What exact text or word-processing formats do they accept, or can you pretty well use whatever software you normally and habitually use? In such formats, is the double-spacing written into the document, or something that's decided only at the point of printing out or displaying on a screen?
     I believe some word processors have a way of switching between single-, double- and one-and-a-half-times-spacing by changing a couple of settings, which would certainly make life very much easier, and wouldn't require extensive editing of the document.
     But I have a concern about using a word-processor myself in that I do not wish to use proprietary formats (like Microsoft Word) which are readable only by people who own the same software or some other program specifically designed to read the format and may do so with varying degrees of accuracy; I have this thing about wanting to use only universally-accessible formats, and I'm not sure how many word-processing formats are in this category.
     This is the main reason I am currently writing in H.T.M.L., not some particular word-processing format. It works reasonably well, and my text-formatting demands are usually quite standard and conservative, but plain text cannot quite cope with them all the same.
     I used to use an older word-processor called MultiMate back in the 1990s, and wrote hundreds of pages of a series of documents I later wanted to put onto a web site. I succeeded in the end, but converting it all and making sure no text was lost was the very devil of a job - one I hope never to have to endure again. That, plus receiving documents from other people in a format they assume I can read but I cannot, has well and truly put me off exclusive or proprietary formats.
Rob Houghton wrote:In contrast to you, I have always used indents to start paragraphs - right from when I first started typing stories on a type-writer aged about 9. Its what I've always done, and when I wrote essays, I had to 'un-learn' it because essays shouldn't be written like that! :lol:
     They shouldn't? Who says so, and what is the reason? Is this some new-fangled rule that was unheard of a while back? When I was at school I was taught to indent paragraphs, and that was that.

Regards, Michael.
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by MJE »

Anita Bensoussane wrote:It's good to see you posting, Michael (MJE)!
     Thanks, Anita; glad you are pleased.
     I think I must have a touch of A.D.H.D. or manic depression in me, because I have this long-held pattern (never planned by me) of falling away from something for an unpredictable longish time, then coming back and becoming very active indeed - then later may tend to fall away again, either suddenly or gradually. But I seem to be unable to remain reliably connected with anything, and participating at a moderate, sustainable level. What I've done in the last several hours would not be sustainable for week after week - I will never reach the 20,000 post level that I see Nigel recently passed. That's okay - I don't view it as a competition to see who can post the most, and I am a bit astonished that I am at least on the first page of a membership list arranged by number of posts.
     I think I was once reasonably well-known here, but I'm sure many of the newer members won't know me from a bar of soap.
Anita Bensoussane wrote:(Having thought about it, maybe it's because the weekly chapters will usually be read online - I myself appreciate extra spacing when reading from a screen - whereas the complete books are intended to be printed off.)
     But that doesn't really answer the riddle - I don't see why you would want to deliberately change that around from one to the other.
     I try to design web pages (for example, those with my stories) in a way that is suitable for reading both on the screen and printing out - but I certainly don't produce two versions of them, one for this situation and one for that (not even by just using two versions of a style-sheet).
Anita Bensoussane wrote:The magazine was aimed at people who liked entering tiebreaker competitions. My first column was a lightly humorous account of my family and the daft or unexpected situations we found ourselves in while following our hobby of "comping".
     I wouldn't be able to do anything like this - I am one of those people for whom inspiration mostly refuses to flow if I am not interested in what I am writing, and the writing, while formally proper, would be totally dull and colourless - with effort I might be able to make it mildly interesting, but it would be an effort, and would lack sparkle. Yes, I know that's the mark of the amateur, but it's the way I am, so I don't even try to do kinds of writing I don't think I can do well at. And I don't seem to find everyday incidents in life inspiring of writing.
     What are tiebreaker competitions, and what is comping? Just entering competitions?

Regards, Michael.
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Darrell71 »

MJE is certainly making up for all the years lost with some very long posts! :lol: :wink: :wink:
Just kidding but anyways, good to see you on here.
zaidi wrote: Darell, you are making some assumptions up there.Being taught doesnt mean learning a language,it means having it as a subject, and what you experience in India, is pretty much similar to schools here.

My point of view is based on my teacher who prepared me for the examination, not teaching me about the Eng Lang.
Can't argue anymore as you're sorta confirming all my points.
Oh, and FYI, the world thrives on assumptions.

:D
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Julie2owlsdene »

Firstly, to answer your question about the publishers, Michael. They did not ask or have mentioned none indentations, they have accepted the manuscript as I wrote it on line, and sent it to them. I'm presuming their edit departments etc do all the work necessary to put my script into book form.

When I send in an article for the journal, I do not use indentations, but if you read my articles in the journal they are indented, so the formats these printers use is already set out, which is why I don't think it matters these days.

When at school some few hundred years ago, :lol: , I was taught in touch typing to indent five spaces. Then when I got into the working world no indentations were required, so since then I do not indent.

I have sent off sample chapters to agents even, and all they say they require is double spacing on the first three chapters, or some take one and a half spacing. One agent didn't stipulate, and I sent in as I typed single spacing no indentations, and they still read my book and said they enjoyed it, but their lists were full etc.

So I'm presuming that these days, with the computers doing most things for us, that indentations don't really matter.

No publisher or agent has every queried the way I set out my manuscripts. I think what they do like is good presentation.

I know my hubby's publisher always says they look for presentation. But that is just one publisher.

So I type in single spacing as in this posting, with a space between each paragraph, as you see on this posting.

8)
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Rob Houghton »

MJE wrote:
Rob Houghton wrote:The strange layout of my manuscript has to do with the fact it was originally saved in different files - one for each chapter, and then, before I sent it to Nigel to read, I put all those chapters into one file like a proper book.
     Rob, I'm just wondering what this is. Are you talking about your serial now on the web site, or a more recent one yet to appear? (Sorry if it's obvious and most know - but, as I said before, I have been away for a bit and sort of lost track of things. Always seems to happen with me.)

You haven't missed anything, Michael - I was talking about a book I sent to Nigel to read recently - an adult novel I wrote when I was about 20 and then rewrote about ten years ago. :-D Most people didn't know about this, as only two people have seen the book, as far as I know. :-D
MJE wrote:
Rob Houghton wrote:In contrast to you, I have always used indents to start paragraphs - right from when I first started typing stories on a type-writer aged about 9. Its what I've always done, and when I wrote essays, I had to 'un-learn' it because essays shouldn't be written like that! :lol:
They shouldn't? Who says so, and what is the reason? Is this some new-fangled rule that was unheard of a while back? When I was at school I was taught to indent paragraphs, and that was that.
I think, rather like publishers, it all depends on 'house style'. The university I was at disliked indents and we had to type essays with double spacing and no indents. They had a certain way of laying out essays and we were marked down if we didn't follow it.


Regards the question of indents, line spacing, etc, I can only state what I have always done. While I've had no manuscripts rejected simply because they were laid out wrong - I have always listened to the 'how to write' books - and also 'Writers Magazine' and laid out my MS as they suggested - double spacing, indented paragraphs, one side of A4 paper. I've always been led to believe that no publisher accepts MS by email but only hard paper copies - but maybe this has altered recently. Five years ago, this was the norm.

When I had a story accepted by People's Friend it was double spaced and indented and I had to submit a paper copy.
Julie2owlsdene wrote:Firstly, to answer your question about the publishers, Michael. They did not ask or have mentioned none indentations, they have accepted the manuscript as I wrote it on line, and sent it to them. I'm presuming their edit departments etc do all the work necessary to put my script into book form.
That's pretty unusual, I would say, as most publishers prefer to receive a book in as near to published form as possible, which is understandable. I guess it depends on the publisher. I think many big publishing houses use layout as a way to reject books, if they have too many submissions. They have a house-style and if a writer submits an MS without following it they use it as an excuse to reject the MS. 8)

Factual pieces - like for The Journal etc - I would always lay out without paragraph indents and with a wider gap between each paragraph, as to me this is the convention when writing a factual piece...just training from college as I said earlier.
'Oh voice of Spring of Youth
hearts mad delight,
Sing on, sing on, and when the sun is gone
I'll warm me with your echoes
through the night.'

(E. Blyton, Sunday Times, 1951)



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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by MJE »

Rob Houghton wrote:I think, rather like publishers, it all depends on 'house style'. The university I was at disliked indents and we had to type essays with double spacing and no indents. They had a certain way of laying out essays and we were marked down if we didn't follow it.
     I see. I wonder why they are so, so fussy about it, though. As I've said, I do have my preferences in this, but I would think surely essays and exams and such things in the course of study should be marked on the basis of their content and clarity, not the page formatting used (as long as the formatting is reasonably clear and neat).
Rob Houghton wrote:I've always been led to believe that no publisher accepts MS by email but only hard paper copies - but maybe this has altered recently. Five years ago, this was the norm.
     I find that surprising. I don't know how publishing works, but I suppose you don't have typesetters painstakingly taking letters out of little boxes to make up the type for printing. I would imagine this would be computerized and automated, and this would seem to work best from a computer file of text, not a paper copy. That can easily be sent by e-mail or on a disk, flash drive, etc. sent in the mail.
     So that would seem to mean that, despite the fact that the author has already typed the text (spending dozens or hundreds of hours doing that) and saved it as a computer file, the publisher wants a paper copy, and will then spend all those hours re-typing it if they want it in computer form to print from. Sounds like a huge wasted effort, just duplicating a lot of drudgery that the author has already done.
     Or am I missing something? It doesn't seem to make sense to me.
Rob Houghton wrote:That's pretty unusual, I would say, as most publishers prefer to receive a book in as near to published form as possible, which is understandable. I guess it depends on the publisher. I think many big publishing houses use layout as a way to reject books, if they have too many submissions. They have a house-style and if a writer submits an MS without following it they use it as an excuse to reject the MS. 8)
     The problem with that, though, is that it will not give even a slight likelihood of eliminating the inferior manuscripts. The one that didn't meet the style rules might have been one of the best as a story.

Regards, Michael.
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Julie2owlsdene »

I've just been searching through both of my Writers and Artists Year books, and the advise they give on submissions. They always say submit to the right publisher/agent. Presentation is important. No editor will read a handwritten manuscript, it should be typed/word processed, using double spacing (I know some agents require l and half spacing) and pages clearly numbered. No mention of these indentations at all. I only have 2014 year, but I can't see it changing much.

I've also just been looking at the requirements of a few of the agents I have submitted too, and none of those state indentations either. So I really can't see it matters much.

8)
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Rob Houghton »

MJE wrote:
Rob Houghton wrote:I think, rather like publishers, it all depends on 'house style'. The university I was at disliked indents and we had to type essays with double spacing and no indents. They had a certain way of laying out essays and we were marked down if we didn't follow it.
     I see. I wonder why they are so, so fussy about it, though. As I've said, I do have my preferences in this, but I would think surely essays and exams and such things in the course of study should be marked on the basis of their content and clarity, not the page formatting used (as long as the formatting is reasonably clear and neat).
I think mainly it had to do with showing you were capable of following instructions - which in itself is a skill! :-)
MJE wrote:
Rob Houghton wrote:I've always been led to believe that no publisher accepts MS by email but only hard paper copies - but maybe this has altered recently. Five years ago, this was the norm.
I find that surprising. I don't know how publishing works, but I suppose you don't have typesetters painstakingly taking letters out of little boxes to make up the type for printing. I would imagine this would be computerized and automated, and this would seem to work best from a computer file of text, not a paper copy. That can easily be sent by e-mail or on a disk, flash drive, etc. sent in the mail.
So that would seem to mean that, despite the fact that the author has already typed the text (spending dozens or hundreds of hours doing that) and saved it as a computer file, the publisher wants a paper copy, and will then spend all those hours re-typing it if they want it in computer form to print from. Sounds like a huge wasted effort, just duplicating a lot of drudgery that the author has already done.
Or am I missing something? It doesn't seem to make sense to me.
I should imagine that once your MS is accepted, the publishers would ask for an electronic copy - I was talking about initial submissions of three chapters and a synopsis. They prefer these initial submissions to be paper copies. :-D
Julie2owlsdene wrote:I've just been searching through both of my Writers and Artists Year books, and the advise they give on submissions. They always say submit to the right publisher/agent. Presentation is important. No editor will read a handwritten manuscript, it should be typed/word processed, using double spacing (I know some agents require l and half spacing) and pages clearly numbered. No mention of these indentations at all. I only have 2014 year, but I can't see it changing much.
Yes - this is pretty much the same as I remember. Perhaps publishers aren't bothered about the indents - but its something I've always done for stories, and so I would feel uncomfortable submitting MS in any other way, as I believe it to look amateurish without the indents. I also dislike the blank space between paragraphs. In the end its a matter of personal choice, but I much prefer using indents, and I don't believe a MS would be rejected for having indented paragraphs. :-) As you say - maybe it doesn't matter much these days...but I prefer to follow the convention of books down the ages, which is to have the indents. Ever since very early on, indented paragraphs have been the norm! To me its just laziness not to use them - laziness on my part, that is!

I always feel that gap between paragraphs really disrupts the flow of the reader, which is mainly why I dislike it. :-)
'Oh voice of Spring of Youth
hearts mad delight,
Sing on, sing on, and when the sun is gone
I'll warm me with your echoes
through the night.'

(E. Blyton, Sunday Times, 1951)



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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Julie2owlsdene »

Some agents will still accept paper, but many these days won't.

Everything seems to be on line.

Here is one agent which I sent my book too, and this is how they want it presented to them. You will everything in online.

Example below.

http://www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk/submissions/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

8)
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Anita Bensoussane »

MJE wrote:
Anita Bensoussane wrote:(Having thought about it, maybe it's because the weekly chapters will usually be read online - I myself appreciate extra spacing when reading from a screen - whereas the complete books are intended to be printed off.)
     But that doesn't really answer the riddle - I don't see why you would want to deliberately change that around from one to the other.
I was just thinking that Keith might have set it up that way deliberately. Extra spacing can be helpful if you're reading from a screen where you can't always adjust the distance easily and where you might have to cope with glare, reflection and distractions like adverts. However, if you're printing out a story you probably want it to look as much like a book as possible - and you won't want to waste paper either.
    
MJE wrote:
Anita Bensoussane wrote:The magazine was aimed at people who liked entering tiebreaker competitions. My first column was a lightly humorous account of my family and the daft or unexpected situations we found ourselves in while following our hobby of "comping".
     I wouldn't be able to do anything like this - I am one of those people for whom inspiration mostly refuses to flow if I am not interested in what I am writing, and the writing, while formally proper, would be totally dull and colourless - with effort I might be able to make it mildly interesting, but it would be an effort, and would lack sparkle. Yes, I know that's the mark of the amateur, but it's the way I am, so I don't even try to do kinds of writing I don't think I can do well at. And I don't seem to find everyday incidents in life inspiring of writing.
     What are tiebreaker competitions, and what is comping? Just entering competitions?
Yes, "comping" just means entering competitions and people who enter them regularly are known as "compers". At the time I was interested in the topic and I used to enter a competition every week or so. In those days there were competitions on all kinds of products - food, stationery, toiletries, toys, cooking utensils, etc. - as well as in magazines. People who were very heavily into "comping" would travel miles out of their way to pick up entry forms from a particular shop or to obtain an elusive item, as proof of purchase was needed when entering competitions. Some would buy a dozen tins of dog food or five packs of nappies in order to try to win a large cash prize (you were usually permitted to send in multiple entries as long as you'd bought enough of a product) - even though they didn't have a dog or a baby. And sometimes they would end up missing out on the cash prize but would win second or third prize - which would turn out to be a year's supply of dog food or nappies! In the column which I wrote under the name of Antonia Bell, I used to write about funny situations as though they were happening to my family.

For most competitions you had to collect tokens from a product to prove you'd bought the required amount (or submit receipts), answer a few simple questions about the company and then write a tiebreaker. That involved completing a sentence which often began: "I like Colgate toothpaste (or whatever product) because..." There was normally a word limit - typically you had to finish the sentence using no more than about 12 additional words. Occasionally you had to write a limerick or short paragraph instead.

Eventually, prize draws became more popular and nowadays you don't see many tiebreaker competitions. Sadly, Competitors' World folded some years ago.
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Rob Houghton »

Julie2owlsdene wrote:Some agents will still accept paper, but many these days won't.

Everything seems to be on line.

Here is one agent which I sent my book too, and this is how they want it presented to them. You will everything in online.

Example below.

http://www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk/submissions/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I think its great if more agents and publishers are now accepting submissions online rather than in paper form. I always felt it was time they caught up with the modern world! :-)
'Oh voice of Spring of Youth
hearts mad delight,
Sing on, sing on, and when the sun is gone
I'll warm me with your echoes
through the night.'

(E. Blyton, Sunday Times, 1951)



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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Tony Summerfield »

Julie2owlsdene wrote: When I send in an article for the journal, I do not use indentations, but if you read my articles in the journal they are indented, so the formats these printers use is already set out, which is why I don't think it matters these days.
Obviously I can only speak about the Journal, but it is nothing to do with the printer, Julie, it is the publisher that does these things. I am the publisher of the Journal and it is me that puts the indentations into your articles. I do indent most articles in the Journal, although I seldom indent 'tops and tails' that I might add. I also use gaps between paragraphs as I think this makes for easier reading with what are largely non-fiction articles. I also don't indent my editorials, but this is really for reasons of space. I even use a narrower font!

I deliberately did not indent 'Anne Kirrin's Journal' as I believe that most things of this nature were handwritten originally and not likely to be indented. Although Enid indented all her articles and stories, her Diary entries were not indented - she needed to use all the space available.

I admit I am a total amateur at this sort of thing and I have never even glanced at books which tell me what I should do, I simply do what I think looks best. But when I send it to the printers they print exactly what I send them and nothing is changed at all.
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Wolfgang
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Re: How Do We Write?

Post by Wolfgang »

Anita Bensoussane wrote: I was just thinking that Keith might have set it up that way deliberately. Extra spacing can be helpful if you're reading from a screen where you can't always adjust the distance easily and where you might have to cope with glare, reflection and distractions like adverts. However, if you're printing out a story you probably want it to look as much like a book as possible - and you won't want to waste paper either.
I suppose Keith uses (or has to use) a preformated template. Using copy and paste (not importing a document) can make documents look totally different in different word processing software.
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