Carol Rose
Basic
WRITING MECHANICS – PART THREE
In Parts One and Two we talked about punctuation, filter words, dangling modifiers, and passive voice. Let’s continue with a few more grammar-related items that will strengthen your writing.
Adverbs
They are not evil. However, use them judiciously to avoid having them do the work of showing, adding unnecessary words, or producing bulky writing.
In DIALOGUE – PART TWO, we touched on using adverbs in dialogue tags, and how using them TELLS the reader what emotion you want them to feel. But apart from the adverbs ending in LY that are sometimes used as part of dialogue tags, adverbs have multiple uses in sentence construction.
Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, determiners, clauses, prepositions, or sentences. They express manner, place, time, frequency, degree, level of certainty, answering questions such as how, in what way, when, where, and to what extent.
https://www.english-grammar-revolution.com/what-is-an-adverb.html
https://www.grammarly.com/blog/adverb/
As with anything, less is more. And this is why adverbs have often been labeled evil. Use them too much, and sentences can become bulky or over-written. You run the risk of having unnecessary words. You’ll need to evaluate your own writing on an individual basis to determine if you’re using adverbs as a crutch, as a way to tell emotion, or perhaps as a way to add description.
Adjectives
Again, these are not evil, but using too many of them slows down the narrative and makes your reader work too hard to picture what you’re trying to portray.
An adjective is a word or phrase naming an attribute, added to or grammatically related to a noun to modify or describe it.
https://www.paperrater.com/page/lists-of-adjectives
https://www.grammarly.com/blog/adjective/
Less is definitely more here. Consider whether the noun needs to be modified. Also consider whether one adjective will do, as opposed to two or more. We touched on description in WORLD-BUILDING AND DESCRIPTION. What you want to be careful with is over-burdening your reader with details. And those details usually come in the form of tacking on extra adjectives:
The tall, green, lush grass
A bright, blue, perfect sky
Keep description to what is necessary to paint a picture, but not so detailed that your reader is working to see all those details in their mind, instead of reading the story.
https://colony.litopia.com/threads/heavy-on-the-adjectives-lighten-up.4066/
Glue words
Glue words are those common words that don’t tell your readers much. They include in, such, as in, is, the, of, on, like, an, and others.
Examples
She was of the opinion can be tightened up to She believed
I was able to see can be tightened up to I saw
But what if writing this way is part of your voice? Then it is. And that’s fine, of course. Just be aware of these words and look for instances where you can tighten up the writing by eliminating them. It will make your prose read less formal or outdated.
https://blog.bookbaby.com/2017/01/what-editing-software-can-teach-you/
https://write.co.nz/delete-glue-words-to-unstick-your-sentences/
Unnecessary or redundant words
We write conversationally, and redundant or unnecessary words slip in there easily.
Example
The string of missteps first began when Serena slipped on the frozen ice.
First is redundant because began means the first occurrence.
Frozen should be deleted because ice is obviously frozen.
It’s difficult to spot these without them being highlighted by an editor or an editing tool. The best advice I can give is to really look at each sentence when you self edit, and watch for instances of these words.
https://www.indiatoday.in/education-today/grammar-vocabulary/story/redundant-words-1-344690-2016-10-03
Repeated words
Just as with unnecessary or redundant words, repeated words can be difficult to spot without highlighting them. You as the writer need to be diligent in the editing phase to see them.
What are they? Words that you repeat too close together in adjoining sentences or paragraphs. They jump out at the reader. You don’t want that. You don’t want anything pulling your reader out of the story.
Sometimes writers will do this purposefully for emphasize or effect, and that’s fine. Just be aware of it and don’t overdo it. Generally speaking, any writing effect used too often will lose the intended effect and simply become annoying.
https://thejohnfox.com/repetition-examples/
That’s it! Thanks for sticking with me through this three-part series. We’ve covered a lot. Obviously there is more to cover, so if you have specific grammar or punctuation related questions, please put them in the comments.
