Whenever I do a line editing or copyediting job, I always make a style sheet and include it when I deliver the edited manuscript back to my client. I’m not sure how many ever actually open it, but that’s okay! As I usually say in the accompanying email, it’s more of a tool for me than for them. In fact, they’re an essential tool for me, and for every other copyeditor.
There are ways in which a style sheet can be useful to a writer, but that’s a topic for another blog.
For now…
What is a style sheet?
In its simplest form, a style sheet is a document in which a copyeditor records all of your favoured spellings, word choices, and punctuation styles so they can keep track of them and ensure they’re used consistently throughout the text. Style sheets are particularly useful for books, comics, or games in a series or shared universe, because they’re a great way to make sure the latest release is styled the same way as the first, creating a seamless experience for your readers or players.
In short, it’s all about consistency.
Spelling and word choices
A style sheet will record whether you’re using UK or US English and which dictionary you should rely on for spelling conventions. For example, when I work in UK English, I generally work to the Oxford English Dictionary, but when I work in US English, it’ll be Merriam-Webster.
But you’ll probably be aware that – regardless of dictionary – there are lots of words or phrases with two or more acceptable spellings (“OK” vs “okay”), hyphenations (“make-up” vs “makeup”), or capitalisations (“God” vs “god”). These kinds of differences might look minor, but if you use both versions within a few lines of each other, it can be distracting for the reader, and we want to remove as many distractions as possible to ensure that they stay immersed in the world you’ve created.
So, part of a copyeditor’s job is ensuring that the choices you make when it comes to these words and phrases are consistent throughout the manuscript. If you’ve used both, we’ll make a decision about which to stick with – either the one you’ve used most often, or the one that makes most sense for some other contextual reason – and we’ll change the outliers to match. Then we’ll use the style sheet to list the chosen spelling/hyphenation/capitalisation of these individual words too, so that we don’t have to keep checking them each time they come up.
If you’re writing in a fantasy world, you’ll have the added challenge of words you’ve completely made up, for objects, animals, people, and places that don’t exist – and that therefore won’t be listed in any dictionary. What if, for example, you’ve created a type of domesticated animal called a “meep” and decided that the plural will work the same way as “sheep” (with no additional “s” on the end)? Your copyeditor will make sure to list “meep (pl. meep)” on the style sheet, and make sure to check the whole book for any stray “meeps”!
Punctuation
A style sheet will also list your style choices when it comes to punctuation. Are you using double quotation marks (more common in US English) or single quotation marks (more common in UK English)? Are you using the Oxford comma? Are you using em dashes with no spaces for asides—like this—or do you prefer shorter en dashes with spaces – like this? Do your ellipses use the ellipsis symbol (like this…) or are they three spaced full stops/periods with non-breaking spaces (like this . . .)?
What else can a style sheet do?
All of the style choices listed above will be relevant to pretty much every editing project, no matter how little text there is. Whether you’re writing a book, a comic, or a game, you will always (consciously or subconsciously) have to make decisions about spelling and punctuation.
But copyeditors often use style sheets for much more than that.
For example, board games or TTRPGs might have lots of different elements – tables, graphics, lists, forms – or a variety of components, where the consistency of the layout is key to understanding the information on them (e.g. a creature’s health points are in a circle in the top-left corner of a card, and their damage is in a circle in the top-right corner). I can also use the style sheet to keep track of that formatting and check it each time, ensuring that there are no errors that might affect gameplay.
And when I work on longer fiction manuscripts, I can use a style sheet to help me check for inconsistencies in other areas – since my memory alone might not be enough over the span of hundreds of pages!
I usually keep lists of main character names and place names, as well as brief summaries of any descriptions included. This creates a really handy tool for me to check the names are spelled consistently – which is especially useful in fantasy where there will be lots of unique letter combinations! – but it also means I can check that descriptions of the characters are consistent too.
If a character is described several times as having deep-brown eyes and then, on page 400, their eyes are described as icy blue, I have a much better chance of spotting it if it’s on my style sheet. If I’ve noted that a house has a balcony on the third floor, I’ll be more likely to notice when the characters go out onto the balcony from the second floor instead. And all this means fewer slip-ups making it into the final version of your book.
I also include a timeline on my style sheets for novels, adding to it as I work through the text. You might wonder what a timeline has to do with style… and the answer is nothing really. But the reason I include it really comes down to that one key word again: consistency.
If I track the days and approximate times as I work through the book, I’ll notice if your band of adventurers arrives at the castle at dawn, has a short fight with the guards, and then suddenly the sun is going down again. I’ll notice if three weeks pass, but your character only sleeps twice. I’ll notice if the countdown to the apocalypse finishes without any of your characters seeming to notice. And if I spot these things, it means you can fix them before they get to your readers!
So why do copyeditors love style sheets so much?
Put simply, it’s because style sheets are super useful!
They’re a neat way to keep track of things as we work through the text – and it’s so satisfying to finish a job with a full style sheet, knowing that you’ve been able to make a positive difference to the reader’s experience of the manuscript in so many small ways!
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