Whoa, yet another article filled with writing tips…cuz we’re kind of into this now. As they used to say on one of TVWriter™’s favorite sitcoms that you’ve never heard of (on account of it was on BBC and now is no more), “Bear with, bear with.”
So, bear with:
by Nephele Tempest
Regardless where you stand with your current writing project, the time will come when you need to edit. I don’t mean rework your plot, heighten dramatic tension, or beef up your protagonist’s motivations. Rather I’m referring to that nitty gritty editorial process of looking at your work word by word, sentence by sentence, and examining the language you’ve used. Do your descriptions dance on the page? Have any clichés snuck into the mix? If you had to read aloud in front of an audience, would you find yourself running out of breath?
Sentence-level editing involves more than checking for missing words or making sure your Find-and-Replace changed a character’s name all the way through your manuscript. This is your chance to shape up your prose and show your skills, not just as a storyteller but as a wordsmith. But a manuscript can be a fairly long document, and sometimes it’s hard to remember everything you want to check as you work your way through from first page to last.
- Cut your adverbs and make your verbs stronger.
- Rework any clichés.
- Eliminate filler words and phrases, such as “currently”, “that”, and “in order to.”
- Refer to people as “who” not “that.”
- Cut repetitious words and/or phrases.
- Divide long, hard-to-read sentences into two or more shorter sentences.
- Fix any inadvertent double negatives in long, complex sentences.
- Hyphenate modifying words.
- Minimize use of “very” and “really.”
- Beware of overusing passive voice/passive verb structures (is/was/-ing verbs).
The list goes on so read it all