A question about permission forms

[polymath]

Mills,

You've posted a raft of questions that have answers that are open to variations but best practices notwithstanding as follows.

Since you're asking about nonfiction, in general a book proposal to an agent or editor is a standard recommendation. Cover letter might also be a query blend. It's an introduction letter for the book, the proposal, and, secondarily, the author.

Font or typeface? Font is the totality of a typeface defintion. Typeface is the family; for example, Times New Roman is a typeface. 12 point Times New Roman, roman face not itlalics, standard face not bold or elite, is a font. Any Old Style typeface with proportional kerning, proportional stroke widths, and serifs is acceptable for business correspondence as long as the recipient's font catalog includes the typeface. Garamond is a sure bet, as is Times. Caslon and Jansan are dicey. Though which face is mostly irrelevant for print, it is relevant for digital transmission. Whether to use a monospaced face like New Courier for manuscript format is a matter of a recipient's preference. Otherwise, use a basic format of 1 inch margins, 12 point roman, undecorated font.

Copyright permission forms should be sent to whoever owns copyright. Some publishers do, some authors do. Though contacting a publisher is a best bet and who might arrange for permission from an author at a price as might an author. I recently did one for a single photograph that ran 380 Euros. Also, some copyright clearing houses can arrange for permissions or at least might have contact information for who does have copyright ownership and how to contact the owner. Keep the original permissions on file, if a publisher asks for permission forms, and will, send copies not the originals.

Etiquette for reviewer and copyright permission thank-yous used to be, in order, telegram, handwritten card, handwritten or typed letter, and now personal e-mail. Telegrams have long since fallen out of favor. The remainder are still in vogue. A principle of thumb is to respond the same way as a reviewer. If he or she uses e-mail, use e-mail. But the gold standard is a personal, handwritten card.

A professional indexer is costly when wordprocessor applications have built in indexing and conformance plugins that do a wonderful job of taking care of those tedious details. Word and WordPerfect are excellent apps for doing that, and table of contents, etc. If you must hire an indexer, the best time to do so is when publication is pending and no substantive changes are in progress. Page numbers change with only slight revisions. However, if using Word or WordPerfect for indexing, and linked index to mansucript, the page numbering changes will follow the revisions. Your indexer should know how to manage revisions efficiently but might charge more for changes than it's really worth.

Book release date, publication date, and street date are used interchangeably but, prescriptively, release date is a projected publication date. Publication date is the formal date a publication is available for retailer acquisition. Street date is the date a publication is available to consumers from a retailer.

Modified business block is the current format preference for business correspondence. Block left justified, single spaced paragraphs, no indent, one blank line between paragraphs, like this post. Again, 12 point Old Style typeface, roman, no decoration.

A book proposal, on the other hand, should be in manuscript format. Indented paragraphs, no paragraph line breaks except to signal subsection breaks with significant changes in train of thought or ideas; in other words, major transitions.

Nonfiction generally does not have the same bars to approaching publisher's editors as fiction. The marketplace is still open to previously unpublished writers, where fiction's doors are closing at publishers and the screening brunt is falling on agents.

[GabbyPahinui]

Dear Polymath,

I greatly appreciate you consolidating all of my questions into one response. I initially was going to do this with the format of my question, but I was afraid that only one or two questions would get answered. I'm making a document on how to write and publish a book that I'll be sharing for free with hundreds of folks, along with a lot of other documents on "self-help best practices" that I've already shared with them, and thus your awesome effort here went to a very good cause.

You covered everything I asked. With indexing, I'll probably try to do it myself first, but I know that one can't rely on the word-processing software alone while mentally tuning out. Otherwise, every mention of certain keywords will show up whether or not they're relevant.

Again, thank you.

Sincerely,
Mills