Tag Archives: indie writing tips

Today’s Writing Tip

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When rewording a sentence, make sure you take out any words that no longer belong. Many editing faux pas examples I find involve extraneous words that weren’t deleted when a change was made. This is another case where the author sees what’s supposed to be there, not necessary what is. Reading your final draft aloud may catch these; if not, hope your editor does.

Authors need to realize that many readers notice these things and can be rather unforgiving if it occurs often enough. It’s a distraction that throws them out of the story and shows a lack of professionalism in putting forth the best possible product. A few here and there is one thing, but a preponderance of them and you’ll lose readers. Trust me on that, because I’m one of them.

Today’s Writing Tip

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Missing words are difficult for the author and sometimes even editors to catch, but not an alert reader. When reading over your manuscript, do so slowly enough to note each word is indeed written as opposed to assumed. Reading it aloud may help, but not necessarily.

I suspect that most authors think much faster than they type, making it easy to skip over words. When you’re on a creative roll this is especially true, when you can hardly get the thoughts down fast enough, before you lose them. Nonetheless, like invisible typos, missing words will throw readers out of the story, something you want to avoid. In some cases, a good grammar checker may catch them, but test it to make sure. If you use beta readers, make sure they keep an eye out for such things, too.

Today’s Writing Tip

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Using astrology for character development is helpful and fun. If you’re not familiar with the characteristics of the various zodiac signs, a book like my “Whobeda’s Guide to Basic Astrology” can help. Get your copy here. 

If you already have an idea what your character is like, it’s usually not too difficult to fit him or her with a Sun sign. You can find some basics here. This will be their core being and provide considerable help regarding how they’ll react to certain situations. If you define a birth date for him, it’s fun to get a natal chart reading from an astrology site like mine, ValkyrieAstrology.com, which will give you even more in-depth information about your character, perhaps even hinting at events in your story.

Actually, it was writing a novel that first introduced me to astrology. One of my characters was into it, forcing me to do some research. I discovered it worked as well as how handy it was for defining characters. It’s quite eerie how well it works, which you can read above in a previous blog.

Today’s Writing Tip

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Fully developing your backstories always pays off. Not only do they contribute to the quality of your characters and plot; you can always offer them as freebies to potential readers. Some background information can be referred to in your main story, but including too much can bog it down. Some can be dropped in here and there as flashbacks. However, lengthy explanations of past experiences that influenced the character aren’t always relevant to the story at hand. Nonetheless, if they’re interesting you can use them as a short story/teaser to readers who visit your website or sign up for your newsletter.

 

Today’s Writing Tip

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When you get to what you think is your final draft, start tightening your story by trimming adverbs, adjectives, and prepositional phrases. Many adverbs go away when you select the correct verb. Make sure adjectives contribute to imagery or emotional impact and avoid repeating them. Prepositional phrases are often necessary for clarity, but make sure it’s really needed and that you don’t repeat the same information later.  Read the sentence without each of these items to see what, if anything, they contribute.

Today’s Writing Tip

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Having your protagonist assess himself in the mirror is one of the most unoriginal ways to describe his or her appearance. Be more creative. Note how other authors do it and when you encounter a great description, study and emulate it.

One approach is to integrate what he or she looks like with action or emotion. Both are best described in a “show don’t tell” manner, which can easily include something regarding their appearance.

Today’s Writing Tip

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A fundamental rule of good writing is to show, not tell. Saying “He was angry” is telling. Saying “His eyes bore into his opponent like steel rods, fists clenched at his side” is showing.

Showing is especially important in rendering emotions, which are essential for sucking your reader into the story. Some emotions are anger, love, hate, betrayal, disappointment, grief, heartbreak, and so forth. These words are okay to use in your first draft, but when you start to edit, stop and consider how you can describe what the character is feeling instead of taking the easy way out. Aim to avoid using that word entirely, but to render it in such a way that the reader knows exactly how your character is feeling at that point in your story.

Today’s Writing Tip

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First drafts tend to be unbalanced, depending on your style. They may have too much or too little of certain elements. For example, many authors, myself included, tend to focus on action and dialog. These are great for keeping a story moving, but the reader isn’t likely to “see” the story in their head or feel much empathy for the characters.

To remedy this, for your second draft, start by checking how your IDEAS are presented, where IDEAS is an acronym for Imagery; Dialog; Emotion; Action; Suspense. Examine each scene to determine if you need to add something to round it out. You don’t want to slow down heavy action with too much detail, but get enough in there so the reader can visualize it. Setting up the location beforehand is one way to handle that, so the reader already has a mental image for the action to occur.

Today’s Writing Tip

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Economy of words makes your message stronger. Using too many that are extraneous distract and dilute it. This is why adverbs, adjectives, and prepositional phrases often add extra bulk that should be trimmed, just like the fat on a brisket.

Flowery writing or over-writing simply doesn’t work. Do you want your reader to get your message or get lost in a tangle of words? [Please note this is not to be confused with saying something so beautifully that your reader (most likely another writer) pauses to admire how well you expressed a thought or rendered a description.]

Being redundant is ever worse, and a special case of over-writing. As a reader, I feel somewhat insulted, like the author thought I wasn’t smart enough to catch it the first time. Doing so within the same sentence or paragraph is even worse. If this is part of your natural style, don’t let it hamper your creativity; worry about it when you start to edit.