Monday, March 10, 2008

Edit it

How do you edit yourself? It's hard. When you read your own work you see what you meant to be there, not always what you actually wrote. Reading out loud helps me see typos and repeated words because when I have to say it out loud, I pay more attention to each word.

Reading from the end to the beginning because again you have to pay attention.

Keep your eyes peeled for those repeated words, unnecessary words, redundant phrases, typos and phrases you love.

In dialogue, I seem to adore well, just, seems. Well, let me just say, I have a list of about twenty to thirty words and I will do a search and find (search and destroy) for those. I love to repeat words, it seems, for emphasis.

Why is this a problem? Because if every sentence of dialogue starts with just or well, boooring. And the characters appear wishy washy. Plus, if the character seems to hesitate, have him simply hesitate instead of appearing so hesitant to hesitate.

Everyone has their own favorites, the ones you leave in the first draft and cut mercilessly during the second draft. What are yours?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I like to read aloud, too. I always end up laughing, though.

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