The Top Eight Ways to Write Better

1. Words Aren’t Speled Right

• I know, I know. I misspelled a word and you noticed it. I can’t tell you how many books, magazines, and websites I’ve seen with spelling errors. Websites seem worst of all, maybe because they’re created faster and people figure no one will notice the errors. One website owner even whined that he thought a few errors were okay because they showed he was human. I thought he was kidding. I’ve known individuals who tossed aside a perfectly good book because they noticed a few errors.

2. Punctuation: Is’nt in the Right Places

• Punctuation is all those tricky little marks like commas, colons, periods, apostrophes, dashes and such. They’re a little like traffic signs: they can indicate contractions, lists, emphasis, pauses, full stops. The writing becomes very confusing and jumbled if the punctuation is wrong or perhaps missing entirely. Imagine what would happen if there were no warning or stop lights on our highways. You get the idea.

3. Sentences Awkwardly Are Written

• Do you see how even one word in the wrong place can make a sentence klunky and awkward? The order of words in a sentence really matters. If a story or a book doesn’t read smoothly, people often reject it for easier fare. Writers should even consider whether certain phrases should be placed at the beginning or the end of a sentence. If you want to draw attention to a phrase, place it at the beginning of the sentence: “Because he was the scrawniest in a family of eight, Sam always got stuck with the dirtiest and most disgusting chores.” See what I mean, you want to emphasize that Sam is weak and scrawny so you put it first.

4. There Grammar are Atrocious

• Grammar includes things like capitalization, using the correct tense, and the correct use of pronouns, adjectives, and adverbs. Subjects and verbs must agree, pronouns must be used with care, and watch the gross overuse of adjectives and adverbs. Probably the most common grammar problem I see is the misuse of there, their, and they’re (and your, you’re, and yore). Grammar matters.

5. People Sometimes Like to Tell you Their Complete, Unabridged Life Story With all the Detailed Trimmings--- Know What I Mean?

• As a free lance editor, very rarely do I have to tell a writer that they’ve got to add 10- or 15,000 words. Usually people overwrite. And it’s awfully easy to fall in love one’s own words. One descriptor for such stuff in the writing world is “purple prose.” More often than not, when I edit a beginner’s novel, I have to cut large portions of boring, extraneous detail from the text. And the beginners are often so attached to their words that, when I’m done, they reinsert the content right back into the manuscript. Sad, but true.

6. I Already Made Sum Changes and Improvements Onc't

• I know what you’re thinking. If you’re just skimming this article, you may be thinking that I’m a English teacher writing simple rules for high school students. No way. This article is for anyone of any age or station in life who takes out a pad and pen or sits down at a computer to type. As a professional writer, I’m constantly aware that I can write better. And you should feel the same way. Everyone who writes can use an editor. But, if there’s no editor handy, read your pages through five or six times, looking for any of the weaknesses I’ve mentioned. Then go about your business for a few days and come back and edit it again. It’ll surprise you how many mistakes you missed. I’m not asking you to become a best-selling author. I’m just challenging you to become a more readable writer.

7. Writing is Abstruse and Recondite

• Somewhere along the way many writers embraced the idea that the bigger the words, the more complex the language, the more impressive the writing. False! The best writing is simple, written at about a seventh grade level. And, believe it or not, writing at a seventh grade reading level can be profound and eloquent. The point is, you don’t impress anyone searching your thesaurus for a bigger or more confusing word to force into that sentence. Now, of course, there’s always the rare exception---some famous writer you’ve read who has a massive vocabulary. Well, don’t forget, that writer has probably been writing for so many years that he or she has built up a loyal audience---an audience accustomed to the vocabulary. It doesn’t mean you should do it.

8. Writing is Repetitive. Don't Repeat yourself. Above all, do not be Redundant

• It happens unintentionally. You have a senior moment. Or you may feel so stongly about a point, that you reiterate it. Don't do it. Even if it's a punch line in your book, if readers see the same thing, perhaps, reworded over and over, they get very bored. And that is not a good thing.