Children's Picture Book - question

Phantasos

Hi all,

I am always writing short stories for children, and recently I adapted one such story to suit a picture book.

I'm been thinking about submitting my PB to some publishers, but there is conflicting information online about the formatting of the manuscript. Some say that you should just lay out the manuscript like a regular story, and others say you should put each 'page' of the picture book on a separate page as it would potentially appear in the finished PB.

Does anyone have any further insights into the Irish/UK publishers and what they prefer? I've been looking online but I keep seeing both methods suggested as a template. The publishers themselves don't lay out specific manuscript guidelines beyond numbering the pages.

EileenG

The Irish publishers just want the MS as a regular MS, without any special formatting. If they accept it, they will arrange artwork themselves.

Phantasos

I figured as much Eileen, thanks.

bigsmokewriting

If you're just doing the text, should be all on one page (or two, at a push!). You could still break it up as you hope it would be broken up in the finished book, but with paragraphs rather than page breaks. (And even then an editor/publisher may disagree with where the breaks should come.)

(If you're illustrating as well, sometimes people put together a 'dummy' copy - but no need to worry about that if you're text-only!)

Good luck!