[stylist] Writing Software

Wed Jun 15 16:20:04 UTC 2016

April,

What document programs don't work with screenreaders? Does this happen with
Scribner? Do you mean in general, or with large bodies of text?

Mistakes do happen, that's just a part of being human. And often, errors
occur even when we try our best, but I've yet to have a full manuscript be
submitted that was not consistent with formatting. Whether school, when I
was writing for the Omaha World Herald, PR work or personal writing I've
submitted. Not to say my work is never without errors, but I've never had
inconsistencies in the text and formatting, and I've definitely not had
sections out of order.

With Word, before sending a document to an editor, you can select all text
and change font, sentence and paragraph spacing, set margins, etc. And you
can double check all this throughout a document. There are commands and
features you can utilize to check all work.

When I was editing magazines, material wasn't always submitted in the same
font or formatting. I would automatically select all text, put it back to
default settings then change font and spacing or add headings, bold or
italicize, set margins, etc. as needed before placing into one large
document. It's the same for my personal work. And all the formatting and
text can be checked with Word and/or JAWS commands (I use JAWS).

When I worked with a PR firm, we all created documents in Word or Mac then
imported into Publisher for the final publication. Everyone was using a word
processor in the initial phases, and it was only when we were ready for
final drafts that we placed into Publisher (which I know is not the same,
but my point being we worked with word processors first).

In my opinion, if material is so inconsistent or has out of order sections,
the writer is either careless, not checking as well as they should before
submitting, or they need a good copyeditor to double check work.
Particularly with out of order sections. This seems incredible to me that if
one is carefully checking a manuscript they would miss this. I mean, shit
does happen when writing and editing, but before submitting, you should
really check and check again then check again to make sure errors like that
have not happened. All my friends who are published hired good story editors
and copyeditors to ensure their manuscripts were free of errors before
submitting. This is the recommended protocol even if self-publishing.

Most my writer friends are literary writers, so maybe that's a difference,
but I don't know any writers who use Scribner. Wait, I know one person, and
he's a screenplay writer. Several use the word processor on MAC, but not
programs like Scribner.

Clearly people use this program, and I'm not contesting its benefits, but I
don't necessarily see the argument that people using Word are more likely to
have errors. If you know what you're doing and double check work, it
shouldn't appear stitched together.

Bridgit

-----Original Message-----
From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of April Brown
via stylist
Sent: Wednesday, June 15, 2016 4:59 AM
To: stylist at nfbnet.org
Cc: April Brown <aprilbrownshade at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [stylist] Writing Software

Sorry, too early in the morning.

Most all of the writers I know use Scrivener.  I can even find you a few
links to people who wrote excellent books on how to use Scrivener for the
sighted.

In general, it is best to keep an entire document together, and not saved in
separate documents.  Agents and editors often laugh at the oddities they
find when they try to work with stitched together documents. Different
fonts, type, and size, or out of order chapters are the most common glaring
errors.  I know.  I used to do it to, 20 years ago.  Today, there is no
reason a program can't handle an entire novel, or other long document in
normal circumstances.  Screen readers do have problems though with some
document programs.  Sometimes, they can only read one page, and never get to
the second page for some reason.  That's a problem with the program, and it
blocking the screen reader from working.

April Brown

Writing dramatic adventure novels uncovering the myths we hide behind.

aprilbrownshade at gmail.com

Website: https://sites.google.com/site/uncoveredmyths/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/UncoveredMyths Google Plus:
https://plus.google.com/116003267969710767555/posts
> 
> 

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