I have this friend who is a wonderful writer and is sweet and helpful and amazing and any other ‘nice’ adjective you can think of—including smart. Smart, she most certainly is. Oh, and she was taught how to share well. She shared these tips with me and many others, so here I am, paying it forward.

These are Rachel May’s 8 Tips to Better Writing::

1: Read your work out loud.

This one is the most important in RayMay’s eyes. And she’s quite right.

What does this do?: By reading your work out loud, you will pick up grammar mistakes and flow problems. Also, you will hear how your audience is hearing it in their heads. If you trip over a phrase, most likely your reader will as well.

2: Vary your sentence length.

Why is this important?: Sentences that are all the same length tend to make the reader hear your story in monotone. By varying up line/sentence length you add rhythm and flow to your writing. To tell whether or not you have sentences the same length, print out the first page of your story, take a pen or pencil and at the start of every sentence draw a line through the words. When you get to a period end the line. At the next sentence do the same thing. Follow that same system through your first paragraph and subsequent paragraphs. If every line appears to be the same length. Cut some of your sentences down into short ones. Read the entire paragraph out loud to double check that you haven’t taken anything out that’s imperative or shortened a sentence where it should, in fact, be longer.

3: Write great descriptions.

Why is this important?: By writing vivid descriptions, you are involving the reader beyond just words and dialogue. Physically imagine yourself in that particular situation…you already know this I’m sure…but it can’t hurt to remind you.
Also, another way to get descriptions just right is to imagine yourself explaining whatever it is you’re trying to explain to someone who doesn’t have that sense. If I were blind, how would you convey to me a sunset? If I had no sense of smell, how would you convey a scent to me?

4: Dialogue can make or break a story.

Why is dialogue important?: Dialogue is important because when you write great dialogue it adds a whole new level to your story. It gives your characters a voice. Try to think about the people you know—how do they respond to mundane conversations or important conversations? Write dialogue that feels natural. Every person has a different rhythm to their speech patterns; try to give each character a different rhythm to their dialogue. This will help the reader differentiate between your characters.

5: Make (-ing) your friend.

Why are -ing words important?: Sometimes starting a sentence with a gerund helps to add a different feel to a sentence.

Example:

She ran as fast as she could to catch the bus, but still missed it.
Despite running as fast as she could, she still missed the bus.
Running as fast as she could didn’t matter, she still missed the bus.

Basically these sentences are pretty much saying the same thing in different ways. Determine which way flows better with the sentence before and the sentence after.

6: Make each chapter stand on its own.

What does this mean?: This means that a person should feel intrigue in each chapter. That if I picked up your book and turned to chapter 14, I should feel the pull of your story as strongly as if I started from the beginning. And every chapter should end with a hook so that it compels me to read the subsequent chapters.

7: Characters with a point.

What does this mean?: I’m not saying that your characters should have pointy heads or have daggers coming out of their skin. No. I’m saying that you should not introduce a character that has no point. Why? Because if you introduce a character without a real point to push your story along, we as the reader are thinking, “well all that time we spent reading about that unimportant character was wasted.” So, if you have superfluous characters in your story, as cruel as this sounds, KILL THEM. No will notice and no one will care. Well, you will. But your readers will thank you for it.

8: Add moral dilemmas.

Why should you do this?: When I was in school my writing professors told me that stories, especially YA stories and children’s stories, should have a moral. Make sure if you’re writing for the children genre or YA genre that there is some sort of lesson to be learned. Take a cue from Aesop’s Fable’s and Charlotte’s Web. They have a moral. Even the more complex YA tales have morals—they may not be as easily defined as say, a Dr. Seuss tale, but they are there. I promise you!

Hope these tips help you! I know they did me.

What tips do you all have? What are your writing secrets?

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Since winning her first writing competition at a young age, Eden Tyler, has only fallen more in love with the written word. She uses her English, Psychology, and Sociology backgrounds to create depth to her own stories and novels while contributing to and running websites about writing. This is what fulfills her, along with working as Co-Editor for Fuel Your Writing, but she also enjoys the freelance work that puts food on the table (and that ever-essential roof overhead) for her family.

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