Writing

If you use free writing tools, will they help make you a better writer? No, they will rarely improve your writing skills, but they can help you spot things you might miss. That’s the big upside with online writing tools, because you can treat them as a second pair of eyes. Keep in mind, though,…

Is it true that you need to avoid starting sentences with certain words? You’ve probably read many times that you shouldn’t begin a sentence with and, but, or so. But are these rules, guidance, or simply opinions repeated so often online that they sound like rules? No, they’re not rules you need to follow to…

If you want to break the comma rules, go right ahead. Before you do, though, make sure you understand the rules. That way, you’ll know exactly which one you’re breaking. When you use a grammar checking tool, I’m sure you’ve seen your checker telling you to omit a comma, and if you do, it immediately…

I know the advice. I understand the advice. I even give writing advice. And then I happily break things when I think I have a better idea. That’s the great thing about advice. It’s not a set of rules you can’t break, but a collection of options, opinions, and suggestions you can choose to use.…

You might have read that starting sentences with the same word is a writing fault. That’s mostly very good advice. Except when it isn’t. Starting several sentences in a row with the same word isn’t automatically wrong. Very often, it’s unintentional or perhaps a sign that your writing needs more variety. However, sometimes repetition is…

When you start a sentence with a description, it’s a quick and easy way to make your writing much more interesting from the very first word. You don’t need to go to extremes because it usually takes only a handful of words to do the job well. Sometimes you already have a description appearing later…

The easiest way to avoid using “it’s important” so often in your writing is to delete it and simply say what is important. It might sound like a trite fix, but the phrase can sometimes sound like an instruction or, at least, a strong recommendation. A lot of the time, it’s just an empty fluff…

If you’re writing fiction, telling adjectives are an easy form of telling to overlook. It’s easy to skip past them because they’re such a quick way to move a story forward. However, speed is not always the best option. Very often, using a simple adjective is a missed opportunity to show a reader what’s happening,…

The reason I keep writing is because that’s what I’ve done since I was around fifteen. At first, it was poems and short stories, then song lyrics, and later, with the internet, blog posts and books. Hardly a day goes by when I don’t write, but I’ve never made it a daily ritual. However, most…

When you write like you speak, it’s much easier to develop your unique writing voice. But don’t take this too literally because when speaking, we repeat ourselves, use filler words and sounds, hesitate, utter unfinished sentences, and change direction without thinking. Good writing is rarely exactly like our natural speech patterns. But when you construct…