What exactly is an "unbound manuscript"? I'm planning on submitting my work to a particular publisher and the publisher requires that I submit my work as an unbound manuscript. What do they mean? Does it mean that they shouldn't be attached together? Thanks.
I'm pretty sure that just means the manuscript is a stack of papers not in, say, a binder, or stapled together. Loose pages. I think?
Yup. You can buy manuscript boxes at larger post offices/office supply stores to hold them, but once they're out of the box they should be loose. I'm really not sure why it's advantageous... I guess so the pages can be easily taken apart, but... why would they want to do that?
Maybe so that they can hold each page of our sweat, blood, tears, and soul in their hands and then crumple them individually before throwing them into a fire. That's what they do before they send us a rejection letter, right?
It's a matter of convenience for them. They have to have separate sheets to pass around sections, make copies, write edits, so on. Put a giant rubber band around it. That makes it easier for them to pull it out of the box in one go.
By the way, don't be afraid to ask your publisher/agent these kinds of questions. You're pursuing a working relationship with them. They might decide on the spot that they want your MS in a large envelope instead of a box, or that they want cardstock covers to protect the edges that are going in a photocopier. You might also have questions about their contract, payments, book signings, etc.
I've heard some admit that they deliberately ask for paper in order to discourage mass submissions. With e-mail it's relatively painless for an author to send out a couple hundred submissions to any agent/publisher with a pulse. That approach would cost the author thousands of dollars with postage included. If you're going to pay to send the MS, you're probably only going to send it after careful research and lots of preparation to make sure your work is absolutely ready. That's the theory some of them have, at least.
If I was getting hundreds of submissions from one person, I'd click the block button real fast and just highlight that person's emails and delete them. That would be preferable (faster and easier) to putting up with finding a place to store submissions that I rejected. There are some who are accepting electronic only, and I don't see them complaining.
? You wouldn't get hundreds from one person, you'd get one from hundreds of people. But if you make it more difficult to submit to you, you'd maybe get one from five people, and each of the five would be someone who really, really wanted to work with you.
I think @BayView means one person sending an MS to 200 different agents, regardless of their stated preferences, rather than someone sending 200 mails to the same agent in some kind of desperate cry for attention.
That's what I originally thought, but there are some weird people with a lot of time on their hands...
