After writing and rewriting several drafts, you’re finally ready to submit your book to agents, publishers, or send it to an interior formatter for self-publishing… But then you notice/remember that the ideal length of a manuscript in your genre is… Read More ›
When it comes to a first draft many writers prefer to just ‘get it out’ – like verbal diarrhea (euww). But it’s often easier to fine-tune and fix things in a second draft than trying to get every sentence and… Read More ›
No, I’m not talking about doing your dusting before friends and family come over for the holidays; I’m talking about this one particular little word “that” 95% of the time can be eliminated from your sentences. It’s true. We just… Read More ›
There are a plethora of ways we authors add extra words, phrases, and sentences that aren’t necessary to the context of our writing. Take my title for today – the first three words after the numbered editing tip say enough…. Read More ›
One of the best ways to tighten up your prose is by learning to find and eliminate redundancies. Trust me, this is easier than it sounds. First, you have to put some distance between yourself and your manuscript (if you… Read More ›
Tightening the Belt on Your Prose, Pt.5 ~ Changing your passive narrative voice to an active voice means understanding what you’ve done (and should be doing) with your verbs. Yes, verbs. Any form of the verb “to be” is considered… Read More ›
Tightening the Belt on Your Prose, Pt.4 ~ One of the most straightforward ways to tighten your writing is to match your sentence structure with your emotional intent and manipulate the pacing in your manuscript. Create or reduce tension/suspense in… Read More ›
Tightening the Belt on Your Prose, Pt.3 ~ What does it mean to balance intent? Well, I suppose you could call it clarifying purpose or keeping it simple – but for me, it’s all about “balance.” It’s not just shortening… Read More ›
Tightening the Belt on Your Prose, Pt.2 ~ There are times when you can vividly imagine something happening or you’ve decided to use a more literary technique and venture into metaphor to better describe how something feels or smells… editors… Read More ›
Tightening the Belt on Your Prose, Pt.1 ~ One of the more difficult, but practical, aspects of self-editing to learn is how to tighten up your prose. Even though your sentences may be grammatically correct, there are a number of… Read More ›
