What are your thoughts about:

Had a publisher who insisted on the following:

When writing it is a T-shirt. I've seen it t-shirt or tee shirt.

There is no 's' on the words backward, forward, or toward. I've mostly seen these with an s

No tag lines after questions or exclamation points.

I'm not saying the publisher was right or wrong, just asking others' views. (Personally, I like the removal of the s on the words)

Also what is the current view on commas before the 'and' in a series?

Oh, one more thing. when is it okay to use an actual number rather than spelling it out? 34 as opposed to thirty-four. 250 as opposed to two-hundred fifty.

slb wrote:

Had a publisher who insisted on the following:

When writing it is a T-shirt. I've seen it t-shirt or tee shirt.

There is no 's' on the words backward, forward, or toward. I've mostly seen these with an s

No tag lines after questions or exclamation points.

I'm not saying the publisher was right or wrong, just asking others' views. (Personally, I like the removal of the s on the words)

Also what is the current view on commas before the 'and' in a series?

Oh, one more thing. when is it okay to use an actual number rather than spelling it out? 34 as opposed to thirty-four. 250 as opposed to two-hundred fifty.

Do it the way the publisher wants...he has the check book.
Comma before and or...some big time writers us it, some don't at time...it's not a carved in stone rule.

Numbers: If a sentence contains many numbers, use figures. If a number starts a sentence write out the number., or reword the sentence.
For scientific or technical use figures.
Joe had 3,000 hats, 10 pair of socks.
Add 50 feet to 100 feet.

Still confused? Don't worry, even those who understand it get confused.

I agree with Domenic; whatever the publisher says goes.

I mostly self-publish these days, so there is no "house style" other than my own. When in doubt, I use the Chicago Manual of Style's conventions or, in case CMOS does not address the question, the good ol' dictionary.

• T-shirt.
  
• As an adverb, "backwards" is British usage, whereas "backward" is American usage. Both are correct. Same with the others. As an adjective use only "backward."
  
• Use an attribution (aka tag line) before or after any bit of dialogue that needs the speaker identified to the reader, that is, where it isn't obvious who says the dialogue. Some educators say to put the attribution on a different line of dialogue to disambiguate who the speaker is. But that's not always possible.
  
• The serial or "Oxford" comma before "and" in a list is usually preferred. There are examples where if you leave it out, you wind up with the wrong meaning.
  
• The usage of numbers can be overwhelming. CMOS dedicates 20 pages of rules to numbers. The general rule is 0 through 100 in whole numbers should be spelled out, otherwise use digits. But there are many exceptions.
  
  

The Associated Press Stylebook differs with CMOS on many things. Those differences usually affect text length. The AP prefers fewer characters in an article.

It is worth applying to Examiner.com to write a couple stories a month.  Their education program is extensive for publishing news stories online.

Note:  publishing news stories online.  I write for a print newspaper and they have quite a few different requirements.

Writing a novel is also different than writing online.

Writing papers for education are also different.

I agree:  write for the publication with the checkbook.

However, having a standard guide (I use Examiner.com) as a focus helps me stay grounded in current requirements.  Then I adjust to publisher requirements that are usually small.

Like all of publishing, conventions for punctuation are changing.

slb wrote:

when is it okay to use an actual number rather than spelling it out? 34 as opposed to thirty-four. 250 as opposed to two-hundred fifty.

On your royalty check

Now what were the other questions?

I think you go with what the publisher wants as long as it is something you consider trivial. It is kind of like people who argue about which way the toilet paper should unwind, which doesn't matter as long as there is some when you need it.
As for writing numbers as words vs. numerals, I like to use numerals when dealing with personal measures (height, weight, age) or precise distances such as 10.5 km or 158 miles. If I am being vaguely precise (the book fell two feet, landing on the floor) then I use words. I feel using numerals gives a more precise and concrete feel, which often I want to avoid doing. Hope this helps.

Thanks. Normally, I write out the numbers (two, four, thirty, etc.) unless, like you said, it's specific or a very large number.