How to do endnotes in a nonfiction (non-academic book)
April 25, 2019 2:45 AM Subscribe
I am writing a general nonfiction book. I would like to include endnotes without endnote markers in the text. I would like the kind where some of the text is included in the end note as a reference, and then a citation. I have absolutely no idea how to do this or where to begin (using Word but willing to purchase other programs.) Any ideas? Thanks!
You will still need to place invisible layout endnote markers in your chapter's text layout to grab some of the text (like the first 3-5 words) for the endnote citation style at the end of the chapter. If your text has no or at least very few graphics, then this layout can be done in Word (and a decent citation manager like Zotero is worth the time to learn and can be wrangled into working with Word too) without too much headache.
If you have a more graphics involved or fancy grid layouts or you plan on moving chapters around a lot, please seriously consider early on moving to a real layout program like InDesign. It's a steeper learning curve but for a relatively straight forward book, it handles endnotes and things well. There are lots of good guides online and decent books.
If you have a publisher in mind, ask for their house style guidebook. If you are self-publishing, then grab a non-fiction book on your shelf where you really like the look and layout, and then follow that closely as a model.
Andrewesque is right about using software like Zotero. I had to by hand change several hundred citations in a book once and it was so painful because they had not been pulled together in a proper format. Once I had them all turned into the same style and citation sets in the software, it was ludicrously easy to update and manage them within InDesign.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 4:56 AM on April 25, 2019 [1 favorite]
If you have a more graphics involved or fancy grid layouts or you plan on moving chapters around a lot, please seriously consider early on moving to a real layout program like InDesign. It's a steeper learning curve but for a relatively straight forward book, it handles endnotes and things well. There are lots of good guides online and decent books.
If you have a publisher in mind, ask for their house style guidebook. If you are self-publishing, then grab a non-fiction book on your shelf where you really like the look and layout, and then follow that closely as a model.
Andrewesque is right about using software like Zotero. I had to by hand change several hundred citations in a book once and it was so painful because they had not been pulled together in a proper format. Once I had them all turned into the same style and citation sets in the software, it was ludicrously easy to update and manage them within InDesign.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 4:56 AM on April 25, 2019 [1 favorite]
Thirding Zotero. As a nonfiction writer, I wouldn't know what to do without it.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 5:14 AM on April 25, 2019
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 5:14 AM on April 25, 2019
Honestly I would go to the library and look at how other nonfiction books format this and just copy one that you like manually with Word once you've decided what you want.
posted by AppleTurnover at 10:13 AM on April 25, 2019
posted by AppleTurnover at 10:13 AM on April 25, 2019
Response by poster: Thanks all, will try Zotero! (Also intrigued by InDesign and will give it a look, though I think it's more than I need for now.) Many thanks!
posted by caoimhe at 2:40 PM on April 25, 2019
posted by caoimhe at 2:40 PM on April 25, 2019
Zotero is great. I use it for school and it always surprises me how easy it is to create bibliographies/endnotes.
posted by ceejaytee at 3:11 PM on April 25, 2019
posted by ceejaytee at 3:11 PM on April 25, 2019
This thread is closed to new comments.
- There are literally thousands of citation and note styles supported, so I imagine there must be at one least citation style that matches what you have in mind
- To insert any kind of note or citation it's like a plugin in Word, you just tell it to insert a citation for whatever source and presto! created
- You can auto-generate bibliographies or works references list
- Once you find the style you know you want, you don't have to worry about the fiddly details of entering citations or making formatting mistakes: as long as the info is correct in the software (where you enter details like via a form) the software will automatically format the notes and citations correctly
- You can find out how many times you've cited something in your text easily and quickly
- Maybe you at some point change your mind on your citation style, or you're told you need to change by your publisher or whatever -- you can change all your citations and bibliography at once just by changing the selected style, because they're all "live." If you enter citations and notes as plaintext then it will be a pain to replace them.
It take a bit of time to get set up if you already have a lot of works and you haven't been using this kind of software, but especially if this is a long-term serious project I think it's 100% worth it for your eventual sanity.
posted by andrewesque at 3:56 AM on April 25, 2019 [3 favorites]