I ate them like salad, books were my sandwich for lunch, my tiffin and dinner and midnight munch. -Ray Bradbury, Farenheit 451
Image Source. Pixels.com
Word salad. When I first heard this description of public speaking and writing, I cringed. The Editor Brigade had found me out. I was no longer anonymous; posting my anti-conformity blog belches safe behind my monitor.
To soothe my wounded pride, I decided word salads were healthy and continued on unabated by common sense rules and good advice on how to write well. Then one day it dawned on me, I could try to get better. This started my journey to share my pain with the world in hopes it might help us all or at least give someone a chance to guffaw uproariously at my gaffs, goofs, and gosh almighties.
Here is a list of things I do very well in my writing but need to stop if I ever want someone to attempt to read what I have written and spewed upon the unsuspecting intelligentsia of the WordPress Universe. These pearls of writerly wisdom were gleaned from numerous sources.
Tense shifting. This is easy to do if you are like me and have no idea if your words live in the past, present or future and you sprinkle different forms of time throughout your manuscript. She began to say, but he said, and they had said that they had been saying the same thing all along. Keep the tense the same between characters in a scene and have clear transitions to different time frames.
Info Dumping. Oh, don’t get me started or we’ll never finish. I bloviate profusely in comments and in my stories. Info dumping is caused by our lack of trust of the reader’s intuitive skills or, in my case, enthusiasm to tell everything I see in my mind’s eye. I tell back story, set up the scene, spend time making coffee before the big secret is spilled or try to clue the reader in dialog or dialog tags. Let the story tell the story and back story and information can arrive in manageable bites over time as needed.
Excessive or overwritten dialog tags. Every dialog requires a call to emotions in the tag. “Argh!” Wormly cried in deep dark black agony at his inability to write a sentence. Or a string of he said, she said with a verb or adverb attached. This leads us to tell not show and confuses speed readers. Keep tags to a minimum, no more than 40-50% of the dialog. Don’t tell the story in tags, let the dialog do the work and a tiny bit of non dialog in between to fill in the gaps. I’ve read where tags should be kept to he said, she said. I don’t think it’s too evil to add he or she asked, replied, etc. But a 27 word dialog tag is better moved to setting up or following dialog in the body of the text. Also keep it between 11 and 18 words in the body of the text to avoid pace tripping the reader.
Repetitive sentence starts. I have to edit word by word to get rid of these. This is when you have a string of sentences in a paragraph that start with the same word like I, we, he, she. Try this impossible task instead. Use a basic noun/verb start and add who is doing the action only if the person, place, or thing hasn’t been previously introduced nearby.
Melodrama. Busted. Save this for when it is absolutely necessary. I read a friend’s manuscript and noticed the two main characters screamed at each other in dialog for 7 chapters. “Let’s have potato soup for breakfast!” Bocephus exclaimed with glee. “For goodness sakes, give that man a Xanax!” Said the reader with heart rending angst. Don’t follow my example and you’ll be fine.
Convoluted, redundant writing. This starts with unnecessarily long sentences, paragraphs and lots of filler words and then falls into word salad. I know. I mastered this technique.
Persistent Grammar Mistakes. This gets everyone. I don’t beat myself up too much on grammar mistakes until I begin editing and then I realize that I never learned a thing in 18 years of formal education and 45 years of a career that required clear and concise communication. What the hell was I thinking? Thankfully, there are a lot of helpful grammar and spelling checkers that can do a lot of the heavy work while we focus on the details. I’ve tried Grammarly, ProWritingAid, and AutoCrit. MS Word and other word processors now include basic grammar checkers. We can win this battle now. The important thing to remember is all of the AI boosted grammar checkers will ruin your story with bad advice. They do help train you on what to look for and ultimately avoid but never give up your control of the narrative to these faulty devices.
Poor scene set-up. I practice this to excess. It’s a byproduct of my vivid and detailed imagination. We can place our characters in a bland scene or spend way too much page space describing a scene. I’ve learned that the scene should be created to conform with the world and environment of the story and the scene description only needs to give the reader enough information to understand why the scene is important to the characters and the pace of the story. Here, our ability to spark the reader’s imagination is key but don’t let the scene drown out the characters unless that is the purpose of the scene.
Flat Characters. Flat characters are used to help tell the story. They are usually characters that don’t need development because they play a minor role in the story. The problem starts when the main character or characters are flat. Readers connect with characters emotionally and our job is to create the protagonist and antagonist for our readers to enjoy this emotional ride through the story. Make a main character relatable and the character will help write the story. Never let a character be perfect unless that is intentional. Give them internal and external conflicts and faults to overcome. Edgar Rice Burroughs did a great job of transforming characters in his series Tarzan and other stories. Decades later, I still remember the scenes I read as a kid. I was immersed in the characters and story. They started out like me, a little spider monkey of a person with more faults than San Andreas. Circumstance and determination transformed these characters into genuine heroes of the empire and I was hooked.
Head Hopping. Oh yes. If you read any of my stories you will see amazing feats of head hopping. I’ll do better I promise. This malady is basically writing what a character thinks especially in a group conversation where each characters thoughts are exposed to the reader. This has a lot to do with Point of View in the story. Generally, we can’t know what the other person is thinking but we can take clues from expressions and actions in the text and dialog.
Show, don’t tell. I hear this a lot and it’s difficult to know exactly what this commonly known clue means. It’s also the easiest mistake to make. The quick answer is explaining how a character feels in the text or dialog, and dialog tags. We are telling the reader what to see, hear, and feel. Instead, we should show the reader what is happening through speech and actions. What expressions, words, actions are the characters doing that clues the reader and lets the reader experience the story as if they are part of the scene. Some filler words are clues to telling instead of showing. Words like felt, decided, think. If you see filler words showing up, you may be telling instead of showing.
Purple Prose. This is my favorite form of writing. Purple prose is writing that is pretentious or overwritten and can lead to melodrama, which I love. Sadly, not all our readers love this descriptive prose. It does have its place but shouldn’t be the foundation of your story because the reader gets numb to it and it loses its effect and slows the story pace to a slither. An example. Farquhar stared deeply into Fawn’s liquid pools of deep blue ocean eyes and felt the all consuming fires of heated passion well up in his loins as he imagined running through the forest naked holding crocus flowers that flapped in the wind like feathers on a gloriously aroused male peacock. Fawn wondered why Farquhar stared at her with a lascivious grin. She looked away when he drooled a drop of glistening slobber. It was lunch time and she was so hungry she could eat a 72 ounce elephant butt steak with a word salad and green beans with salt, pepper, and thyme.
Now that’s a story I want to read or write. I do realize, it might not be widely read or enjoyed. These are my top twelve weaknesses to overcome and each deserves a detailed explanation to clearly understand. I’ll explore these and more in detail as I write my first ever novel that excludes these problems or at least minimizes them.
Disclaimer: the art of writing should always trump process and propriety. The goal is to write. Editing will help polish our artistic endeavors. I’ll cover editing ad nauseam too. My special thanks to PH for igniting the fire of artistry ultimately well done.
Hi Resa! I’m a firm believer in don’t force it. Terrible things happen when our mood isn’t right and the artist is on holiday. The most important rule is to break all the rules. Then we are truly living an exciting life in the vanguard of avant-garde.
Awesome to the max! Yes I have started the novel. Mostly following the recommendations to create the framework first. I have written some of it out of sequence to guide me along. It has been fun so far.
What can I say? Right now my mind is a small bowl of mashed potatoes. Are you saying Grammarly is not going to turn my manuscript into a # 1 bestseller, that I need to edit the editor? That’s too much, I prefer to ramble on with purple prose. Farquhar and Fawn are delightful 🫠
Thank you for this amazingly detailed guide to better writing Dan. It’s got everything one needs to get it done. Are you checking this out for grammatical errors? 😂
Ha ha ha! I did not check or edit this post. I wanted it to be natural and raw so people would know I’m not lying about all my writerly challenges. Your Purple is mastery of the written language. Don’t change a thing! I may have to add the story of Farquhar and Fawn to my WIP. They were instantly delightful. Poor Farquhar, who will save him from himself?
I thought raising awareness would help send people on their own search if they were inclined to do that. This effort to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days was a challenge I accepted but I added my own burden to try to do it as best I could paying attention to the attributes that make a story exciting to read. We shall see and no doubt, I’ll learn something along the way. I like having a little fun too.
I’ve no doubt you will accomplish your goal and I can’t wait to read it. I know it will be outstanding. Your writing. Is always exciting and unique. I’m seldom one to peruse something twice but I have actually C/P and saved your guide. It could come in handy. 📝
I do indeed write straight from the heart. After that, I do try to fix grievous errors but everything I’ve posted is first draft stuff with all my raw emotions fully invested. I can’t see me doing anything else.
I chastise myself daily for the delay. The secret is to provide the feast before everyone gives up and goes to McDonalds for a Happy Meal. Relief is on the way.
That’s fantastic Rene! It’s helping me a lot to acknowledge good technique by writing about it. There is more to come and after all the lead up, we’ll see if the story, Whispers in the Desert has all of the mistakes in it that I warned us about. 😂
It’s a little different than previous stories. As always, I love mystery upon mystery and the layers of symbolism are deep. It is a hero’s journey kind of story, from fear to triumph. It is relevant to what is happening in the Middle East at the moment. Good, by its nature will triumph over evil. We aren’t always sure who is good and who is evil as both sides use the same tools of terror. Our standards of measure have abandoned us. The story attempts to bring them back.
Hi Dan. If I’m not mistaken, you live in or near Talahassee? I hope you and yours are safe despite the hurricane. Considering that here it’s been raining cats and dogs for days now, and the hurricane only passed by…
Thank you, Brian. I have family in Tallahassee but moved to north Bama because it’s getting too windy in Florida. We all made it fine but below us wasn’t so lucky. Prayers are always appreciated.
Hi Dan. Thanks for getting back so soon. I hope your family in Tallahassee is all right. 🙏🏻
So you’re in North Alabama now? Very pretty around there. We once rented a… “cottage” in one of the parks up north. Forgot the name. It was by a lake. Spent a fantastic few days. And cheap since it was a park. The house was great. Wish I remembered the name of the park. All I remember was it was near Huntsville.
Take care my friend. (Or as they say: Ye be good naw ye hear? 😉)
There is Lake Guntersville near Huntsville. It’s a large park and recreation area. Maybe that was the place you stayed. It is beautiful there. Everyone in Tallahassee checked in that all is fine. In fact, they had clear sky’s and sunshine the next day. Lots of leaf litter but no damage. I was surprised since much of the coast was ripped up. Thank you for the hope and good wishes, it paid off. I’ll be-ah gud cheer, my frin!
Lake Guntersville? Hmmm. May well be. It was very beautiful. One -of many- things about the South, nature is beautiful. And American national or state parks are incredible.
Glad your relations were all good. Pff.
👍🏻
That’s another good thought. Sometimes one (I) gets so overwhelmed by all the “rampant” stuff, that one forgets humour… Thanks for the reminder…
Much obliged.
I don’t see you writing that way at all and never have. You’re brilliant from the first idea and word on the page. You are a natural and I see you onlt getting better. May be to hard on yourself???????
Thank you M. I always set high goals for myself but also try real hard to be humble about my accomplishments. I’ve taken this on as a challenge and also as a way to improve. The main theme is to share what I learn and to use myself as an example. There is an art to writing that covers many levels in uncountable ways. We all have a place where we can shine. Plus, a little humor in the mix is always fun. But, you already know all that.
I’m not a writer, you are! I’m a blogger that has improved my writing over 24 years. There is a huge difference, it’s called many things but creative is at the heart. I know your humble and that makes me like you more, if that’s possible. There is always room for humor. 🙂
I see you’re building yourself up for the process of writing a novel during NaNoWriMo month and you decided to shared one of your gym work out training sessions with us.
That’s exactly it, Chris. I don’t have a lot of skills in the details of writing well so as I study, learn, and apply what I learn to the new Novel for NaNoWriMo, I share the process on my blog. When November starts, I’ll begin sharing the novel too. It will be in its first draft form so we can see some of those mistakes and fixes.
When I started my own journey of the same I kept a loose log. You’ll find it on my site, Writer’s Log. I also kept (keep) track of hours spent; that elusive 10,000 hours thing. You might do the same.
Your 12 are badges of writer’s merit. There are dozens more, as you have no doubt found. I wear a few myself. My favorite, and one you will want to add, active vs passive. If I read more than one “was” in the first few sentences of a story. Later.
On your 12…
No mixed tense, yup. But mixed time frames. Humans naturally think in past, present, and future terms. Mix em up. Play with present tense, talk about challenging.
Info dump, make the reader work for your story clues. Covet them. Be frugal.
Tags, people move while they talk. And read your story aloud. Tags disappear when reading? No, they don’t.
POV, this was my bugaboo. I stick to chapters per character, now. 3rd person is distant. But, 1st person is intimate and engaging.
FYI, I’ve got a writer’s wrules doc with twenty or more instructions from Phil, all documented, all with examples. From those, and many others collected over the years, I’ve tried to immerse myself, drill these patterns into my writer’s will. Unfortunately, only time and effort work to hone one’s skill. But, directed writerly tasks, “use only active verbs in a paragraph,” do help.
Have fun and think about maintaining a log.
Adding a quote to your excellent post. George Clemenceau was a French politician who won WWI on the French side, also ran a newspaper, ‘specially when he was in the opposition. The story says that Clemenceau when interviewing a new journalist to work at the paper would say:
“Young man (not many women then in papers) you will write in my paper. A few words of advice: Write complete sentences. Subject, verb, complement if need be. Be wary of adjectives. Use as little as you can, adjectives are the beginning of subjectivity. And if you are thinking of writing an adverb, call me.”
Believe it or not, I did the same speech to my new executives in Market research who would have to write reports…
Mr. Clemenceau gave very good advice, especially concerning adverbs. I like how we can write perfect English and still be wrong. Know what to write as well as how to write is a good start.
Complete sentences are fine for academic and most journalistic writing. They are not a requirement for fiction, dialog or marketing. Mark Twain agreed with adjective use – when in doubt, strike it out. Adverbs are bullshit any way you cook them.
I am totally convinced. This is my new mantra. Now, to put it to work doing good and interesting things with my story telling. My elders were great story tellers, especially in the hunting camps around the camp fire. I think it came from our Norwegian Pagan ancestors where funny stories were akin to X rated religious sermons. I was just a kid and lived in mortal fear of deer with huge antlers that walked upright with glowing eyes. I never saw any except at night after story telling hour was over.
I was raised with one of the unique American dialects of the Southeastern US. we were often believed to be inferior Homo infidelis species due to our accent. However, over time we noticed that none of our detractors could survive a day in the heat and work we performed with relative ease and fun. Our language enveloped from trying to speak while in perpetual heatstroke. We developed iced tea with high concentrations of sugar to survive til the end of the day when we rehydrated with mass quantities of beer, whiskey, and moonshine, our favorite. 😅🍻
Again very true. Personally? After my initial 3 weeks of dismay at the language, once I caught the rhythm, “Ah was fahne. And I do like Southern drawl. There is a peaceful quality to it, one doesn’t get up North. e.g. Noo Yawk: “Get outta my way!” (Another place and people I like very much too. Just different.)
Be good Dan.
Thank you Brian! The same best wishes to you and yours. My grandfather was in New York during WWII awaiting his ship to take him to Hawaii. He frequented the local restaurants where he was given the nickname, Alabama because of his heavy southern drawl. He never told them he was from Florida.
Haha! Them good ol’ Yankees can’t tell the difference can they? I can imagine how the nickname, “Hey! ‘Bama!” must have made him smile…
Now, a ship in New York to go to Hawai? Isn’t that the other way round? Not to mention a lot of German subs in the Atlantic…
LOL, you are right. I think he was actually shipping out for sea trials on his brand new Destroyer Escort, The USS Conklin. Hawaii was gained by a trip through the Panama Canal. He later joined Admiral Halsey’s fleet and was in the Pacific until the end of the war. Imagine his deep southern drawl on the ship’s coms to the Captain, a West Point grad, when he spied something suspicious on their brand new RADAR system.
“Lord, Lord. Bless mah soul…”. 😉
So they went through Panama. Interesting, I always imagined convoy to the Pacific started in good ol’ Dan Francisco…
Radar was indeed brand new. Made a big difference in the war. You should send your story to GP. He specialises in the Pacific theatre. (Theater?)
I believe you are right. Gramps did make his Pacific sorties out of San Fran to Hawaii and then on to the Pacific Ring. He had a lot of stories to tell. He participated in a lot of famous battles and a lot is written about his ship and their accomplishments. Of course, the battle ships and aircraft carriers got all the glory but the little destroyer escorts were in on every island captured and every battle.
Must have been interesting…
Now, in war, there is no “little”. Everybody participates. And about the islands, few people realise that Americans won the Pacific bak, one island at a time. And the Japs fought to the last on every island… Amazing.
It really is an amazing story from the grand strategies and scope of the Pacific Theater down to the individual stories of how America emerged from abject poverty and near bankruptcy to the richest nation on earth. It’s a double edged sword but at that time, we were truly The United States and diverse ideologies were checked at the door of the military, schools, and institutions of commerce as everyone did something to ensure an end to the war through victory, not this mindless forever war strategy with victory being a forbidden word in all official documentation and communication.
Just bought Peter Turchin’s book “End times”. In an interview, he mentions that one of the sources of Chaos, is the numeric growth of “elites” e.g. “1%” growing in numbers for ,limited number of spots resulting in full frontal fight. It could be what we’re witnessing in the US. What happened in the French Revolution with the Terror. What is happening now in France with dozens of young and not-so-young politicos who can’t stop fighting while the country is going down the drain…
I just tralised this morning that the US election is in less than a month now… OMG.
The End Time seems it may be prophetic. For several elections now, I’ve felt like running for the top spot in Government was a competition between Stalin and Hitler. This year we exercise our constitutional right to choose who and how we destroy ourselves. I can see sacrifice for the greater good of liberty and freedom but suicide as an election option just doesn’t seem right to me.
A very apt comparison. In French we say soemehing like having to choose between plague and cholera…
Choosing how to destroy ourselves is quite appropriate too… Well. Another saying: Hope is the last thing that dies…
Don’t tell anyone, Brian. It might ruin my reputation as a curmudgeon, but hope springs eternal in my heart and soul. I believe in humanity and find it everywhere I look. Of course, it can be hidden behind a wall of naughtiness, so I have to look carefully.
You’re right. And I am grateful for your change of perspective…
BTW, I hope you and yours will be safe with Milton. (Can’t help but think about Paradise Lost, which I haven’t read, just bits n’ pieces)
Stay safe.
Thank you Brian. We had a favorite acronym in the Army. BOHICA. Bend Over Here It Comes Again. And so Milton will take care of anything that was missed by Helene.
I can well imagine. Don’t remember what the French equivalent was. Something like when the major chews the captain in front of the soldiers. Then the LC comes and chews the major. etc.
Just take care.
There are more commonalities that one thinks. Levi-Strauss analysed myths in the Americas from British Colombia all the way down to Tierra del Fuego. He found that despite the thousands of years, the hundreds of languages, there wasn’t more than a handful of myths. Apparently passed on from one camp fire to the other, mixed, twisted, but the same few myths.
So, yes universal problems.
I hope you and yours fared well with Milton.
Happy week-end.
Thank you Brian. What an interesting fact. We all hold more in common than we know. We didn’t get but a little sprinkle and puff of wind from Milton. Not so from our friends south of us. And now another tropical storm is forming in the Gulf. This could be strike three for Florida.
I think it’s quite an amazing feat to knock out the whole list. We may be among the chosen few. I wonder if there is an award for doing the whole list in one story?
I’ll mention to you as I mentioned to Mole and my dear friend Mr. Sensitivity George – Stop. Not writing, stop over thinking. George had a great concept and zero discipline to execute the story. Mole is a control freak who likes to use vocabulary flashcards. As you have proven here, and I am no exception, let’s not overwrite a fucking grocery list. WordPress, okay. Story? No. Unless you WANT your work perceived as about you, then by all means expose yourself. Try not to get hung up on all the bullshit. Just write, with a clear head, look straight ahead and listen. If you write a junk sentence, clean it up. If it’s not working that’s the writer in the way. Toss it and move on. Remember. Many successful authors break rules. What’s important is the story. Once again. Stop writing, start listening. To your characters and your voice. Otherwise you’ll be too busy being concerned about output and write shit or wood carvings. Here are two gifts of brevity but sum up what 10,000 pages of “how to write” cover. And a few things they don’t.
I thought I was crazy for doing what I do until I saw this and discovered all pantsers have the affliction and its okay to listen to the story and not yourself. Watch the video, too. It’s hilarious. And educational.
This is priceless Phil. Thank you. I am a true pantser at heart that writes while in a coma and when I’m done, I have no idea who wrote that stuff. It was the characters and maybe my head elves. They usually wait until I give them a little depth and then they just take over. I thought this project would be one of those Bob the Builder kind of things where I post my story with a little brush off to change all the thier to their and thee to thuh. Then go over the bovine digestive stuff make over until I have fine wood chips that will burn in the fireplace and leave nothing but a fine ash. After that, it’s business as usual. I have been rethinking this. It might migrate to something totally different but, hopefully it will contain irreverent humor and small sparkles of brilliant effort. I’m too lazy to overexert myself unless it’s eating ice cream or apple fritters. We do have fun out here, don’t we?
Thanks Anymole! I’ll check the bowels of my website and see if your comment was misdirected but still whole. I tell you, those WP gremlins are always playing whack a mole with comments. I hadn’t thought of a writers log. Will be over to visit soon.
Great feedback Anonymole! This is a keeper too. I have enjoyed Phil’s feedback and guidance. He has a way of appealing to my old Sergeant Dan persona which made cursing an art form to motivate the young and unmotivatable. I am collecting good advice too. I hope to put it in a database so I can search on a subject and get all the good advice I can handle. If I eventually stop consulting it, I either died or finally learned a thing or two. Checking out logs too.
Hi Teagan! I do remember every bit of kind advice you gave me in my beginning. What a mess, I was. But, the encouragement to continue while making adjustments based on sound advice has helped a great deal. I healed some long standing emotional pain and moved on to seek the art of a well told story. There is much room to continue to improve, continue being the most important word. 🤗
Hyperion Sky 
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