Have you been trying to format your novel and struggling to figure out why there is a gap of space at the bottom of some pages where there should be text? I struggled with this when I formatted my first book in my Ember Files series. It was maddening trying to figure out why some pages had a large (and unprofessional-looking) gap at the bottom. I discovered that orphaned and widowed tasks might be the cause.

The orphan and widow tasks function in the Word is a built-in feature that keeps the first and last line of text in a paragraph from appearing alone. So, the lines of text will hold together and move to a different page. To adjust this, you highlight the text. From the Home Tab Ribbon, you select the paragraph arrow.

This opens the Paragraph Box. This box has two tabs; select the second one: Line and Page Breaks. The Widow/Orphan control will be checked. Uncheck it and click okay. This should shift the selected text and hopefully fix the gap.

Keep in mind, there may be other formatting issues in play. For example, margin or header/footer spacing. Changing margins will change where text for the entire document sits: what page and where on the page. So, there is a bit of trial and error with this. I edit for orphaned and widowed tasks last when I am formatting. I start at the beginning of the document and work down because changes higher in the document will affect the text lower down. So, if I adjust the orphaned and widowed tasks in the first few chapters, it will change where the text in the later chapters sits on the page by moving it up or down.

I hope that makes sense. Consider experimenting with a bit on a rough document so you can get an idea of the overall effect.