tips for writers

pharaoh3

1. Relish every word, their sounds, cadences, and tones.
2. Find you own voice and style. Observe the way you think and talk. This may help you to identify your voice.
3. Be consistent with your POV (point of view).
4. Show, don’t tell. Use sensory words that entice the reader’s senses. Yet, don't over season.
5. Be simple in your writing, but cut deep.
6. Don’t be afraid to take risk. Experiment with themes, styles, and characters.
7. Seek beauty in the world. Rise each morning with eyes that seek love and beauty in all things. A writer’s eyes are constantly exploring new vistas, even if there are right at your feet.
8. Find the right pitch. It helps to try and use the first word that comes to you.
9. Avoid cliché’s or overused phrases.
10. Avoid gluttony. Never use two words where one word will do. Don’t pass over strong single words in favor of phrases made of nouns and adjectives.
11. Don’t try to impress you audience with your intelligence prowess. The goal is to write a compelling story.
12. Writers that become preoccupied with their diction, loses sight of the goal.
13. Avoid be vague or abstract, unnecessarily.
14. Avoid euphemisms that conceal reality, not reveal it.
15. Verbs add verve. They are the engine that drives every sentence.
16. Don’t develop a reliance on the verb “to be” (in all of its forms).
17. Avoid overusing “ly”. Instead, look for the verb that will get your point across without an adverb to qualify it.
18. Find tune you modifiers. Don’t use weak adjective to prop up weak nouns.
19. Avoid thumbnail sketches in the author’s point of view whenever a new character enters the story.
20. Strike a balance in the use of dialogue, action, and narration in your writing.

Insect Overlord

And the best hint of all:

Use a font that people actually want to look at!

rockbeer

Fancy reformatting that, Pharaoh?

While you're at it you could correct some of the terrible blunders in it:

"Find tune you modifiers"
"Avoid cliché’s" - and inappropriate apostrophes.
"Don’t try to impress you audience with your intelligence prowess." No danger of that in this sentence.
"The goal is to write a compelling story." This one really annoyed me. Who exactly is laying down the law about what the goal is? Why does there have to be one anyway, and even if there is, why the hell should I let someone else decide on my behalf what it is?
"Avoid be vague"

Actually, you know, I think most of these tips are garbage, and based on all sorts of presumptions about what people 'should' be trying to write according to some arbitrary and undefined scale of values, probably based on some O level english pass notes combined with a Mills and Boon jacket blurb.

I hate these canned guides to how to write 'well'. The only one of these I'd pay much mind to is "Find your own voice and style". (And I might add "read a lot".) Take care of that and the rest will follow.

Matt Holck

There may be some valuable material in here

please reformat

silvine

Sweet Jesus, my eyes :eek:

Phototoxin

And the best hint of all:

Use a font that people actually want to look at!
__________________

lolz! :pac:

Indeed. Its a bit erm.. obvious..