Style Manuals and Style Sheets

Style sheets are sometimes confused with style manuals. Both play important roles in the book industry. Style manuals are the giant documents that communicate specific preferences for how grammar, punctuation, references, format, and other aspects of a written document are handled. Most novels and nonfiction will follow The Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS) if they are being published or marketed in the US as it focuses on American English. The current edition (eighteen) came out in 2024 and with almost twelve hundred pages and a bright orange cover, it’s hard to miss it on your bookshelf. There are several other style manuals that are standard for specific academic disciplines or types of writing and there are style manuals for fiction and nonfiction that are geared toward other English variations, like British English or Australian English.

But what about style sheets? These are much shorter documents, created by companies and other organizations as internal guides for employees, consultants, or others who create written products for the company. They don’t address the vast number of topics that are included in a style manual. Instead, they focus on standardizing those particular aspects of written documentation that leaders believe are important, such as official name of the organization, logos, and tone of documents. For example, a ski resort might want a friendlier tone in their promotional material than an investment group would. This would be specified in their corporate style sheet.

Style sheets are also created by authors and editors. My next post will talk about how style sheets are useful as a manuscript makes its way through the editing and publication process.