Lady Dae Writes

            So the last time I talked about wordiness, it was in reference to scenes or paragraph which was what I did in my previous run-through of my novel, which is more so editing since I was taking out huge chunks. But now as I go through the simpler, less frustrating process of proofreading, I want to talk about those words and phrases that make a story wordy.

            The first time I spoke about this, I didn’t go over the phrases and types of words that make a novel or any story wordy. As I’m writing this though, I’m thinking about some of the stuff I read in my Lit class, particularly the stuff that Mary Shelly’s mother wrote. Talk about a modern editor’s nightmare. It’s full of redundancy, superfluous words, and all kinds of stuff that would make me throw a book across the room, but I that was in the Seventeenth century and the woman was trying to prove a point about the intelligence of women.

            In any case, repetitiveness is one of the things that can really cause a novel to be wordy. In my experience and as I was going through my novel, if you look at the beginning of your sentence and the end of your sentence, you may find redundancy. Many times it’s in those phrases like as a matter of fact, though, however, the reason, because of etc. These phrases or things that mean similar things to them or work in the way these phrases do are where I found most of my redundancies because they can be tagged at either the end or beginning of a sentence and sound good.

            I also found redundancies at the end and beginning of paragraphs. I would say something at the beginning of a paragraph and then say it again at the end. That comes from writing essays where I state my topic or thesis at the beginning and then have to restate it at the end. But in novels and in short paragraphs in particular, that isn’t necessary unless you do so on purpose. But many times, you’ll find that you did it unconsciously in trying to make sure you got your point across.

            Another place I found wordiness is in my verbs, particularly in the use of have, has, and had. I would say things like, She had been working all night in places where I could have easily said, She worked all night or She was working all night.  No in all those forms, the way those verbs are used can change that tense or the implication of the verb just slightly. For instance had been working can mean that she worked and is still working, while She worked all night is strictly past tense. But I was using had been or had something when I could have just used the past tense or a phrase that was equally shorter. It usually made for a much smoother read.

            There were also places where I described something and then said it again later. So for instance, in the beginning of my novel, I establish in some way that my character has dark brown hair. So that means I don’t have to say that she has dark brown hair again every time she runs a hand through her hair.

            I also don’t constantly have to remind the reader that someone is beautiful or even waste time on telling what my character is wearing every scene unless it’s relevant to the story. So while it’s not necessary to take all those references out, you don’t need to throw it in the reader’s face either, even if it is relevant.

            Also,  I have to talk about the adverbs. Now I've gotten good with not using those, but I seemed to like these three words a lot: suddenly, abruptly, finally, especially when I got towards the climax and battle scenes. It's not that adverbs are bad, but they usually can be replaced with stronger verbs and if you need an adverb, try using ones that don't end in -ly. In my case, the verbs I had were just fine and needed no adverbs to help build them up. So many of them were cut and those that weren't, I might go cut anyway and find a stronger verb to help.

            So this was just some of the things I observed when I was editing and that I will certainly be on the lookout for as I proofread. But no more tweaking the story thankfully. The story and structure are solid. Not to practice writing queries…

            What lessons can writer’s learn from the tortoise and the hare? Pacing is what. The tortoise won because he put himself at a good steady pace and got across the finish line, whereas the hare wore himself out halfway through the race. What’s this go to do with writing?

            Well it goes two ways for the writer. One is that the writer should pace themselves and not try to rush to the end, not only because it can burnout the writer, but it can make the story seems rushed and ruin it’s pacing. However, you try watching a tortoise race and see if you stay awake long enough to see him get to the end…. See what I mean. Pacing does depend on the genre of course. Suspense and Thrillers are generally fast, but even they don’t have to be rushed and God forbid their slow. Anyway, there are many examples of bad pacing in a novel and it happens for one reason or another.

            One reason it happens is that the writer is trying to get done with the novel. It happens to me. I want to finish this novel and get it over with because in four more weeks, I start school, so this four weeks is it for a while and I pump out the story, sometimes leaving details and words out that will affect the pacing. Not only that, but when that adrenaline rush kicks in as I write the end of my novel, I almost always miss a few crucial details that I have to go back and edit in.

            The worst type of rushing though is the kind where the pacing gets messed up because the writers is obviously trying to rush to get to a particular scene they’re trying to write. I never had this problem. I’m always one who liked a good set up so that when I got that scene, it really packed one hell of a punch. But a friend of mine did have that problem where the pacing was too fast, therefore when he got to that part he wanted to write, it didn’t seem explosive or important because no events led up to it. It had no impact, no release of tension.

            On the flip side, there’s the stories where the pacing is obviously too slow and focuses on things that really don’t do anything to build up the story at all. This usually happens when the writer is trying to get to a word count and fill in the story to meet the goal. I used to have that problem, but now my novel is a million times better since I cut it out.

            So you think you have one of these problems huh? No need to fear. Lady Dae is here with tips on how to fix these issues.

            1) You don’t have to write in chronological order: You really don’t If it’s a matter of you rushing through the novel to get to the part that you’re really excited about, write it down. Writing out of order like this can also make the story less daunting as it will be like writing a bunch of short stories to put together. Do be careful of the flow of the story when doing this though. Make sure it’s not choppy when you put it together and edit accordingly if you see any continuity problems. Personally, this doesn’t work for me. I generally need to write up to something, which bring me to my next tip.

            2) Write up to the scene: Generally, this helps me not drag out my novels, but it can also help a writer who rushes. If you put yourself in the mindset that every scene you write must somehow move the plot forward so that you get to where you’re going, you can help your pacing. But only can it help focus you so you don’t rush, but it can stop you from writing a bunch of unneeded scenes and chapters that are just there for the sake of nothing.

            3) If you feel like you’re in a rush, stop: This is the best thing to do if you’re prone to rushing. If you feel rushed, like you only have an hour to be done before you have to go to school or something important, just stop. Sometimes I won’t even get started because no doubt I’ll be beating myself over the head trying to add detail to something I rushed through.

            4) Listen to Music: I know some people can’t listen to music and write. That’s fine. But a little music can really help with pacing. Fine a song that goes with the tome of whatever you’re trying to writer and write as you listen. The best music for this is soundtrack music. Try it.

            5) Rome wasn’t built in a day: Your novel won’t be written in a day, and even if that was the case, you’ll spend much longer editing it. So better to slow down and take care of these issues that have to go back and do some serious editing for structural problems that are a result of bad pacing. Trust me. You don’t want to do it. Take the time to make sure you have a nice pacing now.

Word Count, Pacing, and the Filler 

As I comb through my novel this last final time, I am seriously understanding the meaning of what people say when they say something’s wordy.

All writers have the tendency and something like that is perfectly fine in the first draft, but as I edit, I really see how it drags down the story. The use of adverbs for instance is a common way to find wordiness. Take that sentence right there above that I opened with.

See how wordy that is. I can get the same effect with fewer words. Mind you, I am habitually wordy on this since it is a blog, but it’s good to know I do know what I’m talking about when I can critique and dissect my own work on the spot. Anyway, let’s revise that.

Note that I only corrected some of the wordiness and didn’t put exactly what people. It’s not needed for this lesson. But you can see that we get the same impact. In fact, the impact is better that the original sentence because we don’t have to sort through all those unnecessary words. But not only do I have to look for adverbs, adjectives and other words that weight the sentence down, I have to look for entire scenes and paragraphs that don’t move the story forward.

That doesn’t mean that you don’t go into detail and can’t have paragraphs that go into detail (In fact I may need to incorporate some detail when I run back through for proofreading), but I’m talking about those scenes that are just there for the simple purpose that there are there and since I’m working with an old manuscript, there are a lot of them. So you have to ask yourself, does this scene really belong here and it hurts to do for I had some really witty lines in some of the scenes I wrote, but the story was better in the long run.

Now this will seriously hurt your word count, as so far I’m minus about a thousand words, but that’s much less than the last edit which means I probably got it all. I’m looking at going from 72k to 65k, which is fine. It may become more because I will definitely add more detail as I reread it for flow and clarity, but the good thing about trimming in writing is that you don’t have to wait for it to grow back like you do when trimming a bush. If you think you trimmed too much, go back to the other version.

So I just felt like writing this as I come to the end of editing my novel. Can’t wait to be finished. I’m still not sure if I’m going to query agents or self-publish as an e-book, but I’ll see. Hope this helped someone to know that they’re not alone. This veteran amateur is doing some of the same things you are right now.

What is it with me and Twilight lately? I hate that stuff, but I went to look at it to form my own opinion on the story and that’s what inspired this topic today because so much was just so wrong with Eclipse, in particular the pacing and feeling that it wasn’t needed in relation to the rest of the series, though it had some nice battles and people tearing people apart.

Anyway, down to business. Word count. Word count is the number of words in a novel and the language we writers talk in when we want to talk about the length of a novel as do publishers, agents, and editors. For us writers, the longer the word count, the longer the book and for all of us writer novels, the goal is on average 75k words, more or less depending on the genre. So you’re 50k in and you’re panicking because it looks like you’re not going to hit that goal and for your genre, you need to at least hit the 65k mark.

So you decide you need more words, something else to happen and so you add another chapter. You really don’t need it but you drag out that scene, add in as many words as you can, go back and add words and lo and behold, you make it to that 75k goal…

Problem… Now go back and read it. Do you notice that your pacing is significantly messed up because of it, that by trying to make important something that really shouldn’t have been there in the first place, it feels fake? Yeah. That’s what happens when you’re shooting for word count instead of letting the story tell itself and end where it wants to.

Generally when that happens we call that a filler and while fillers are fine every now and then, they seriously mess up the pacing of your novel, especially if you try to get it to conform to the pacing of your novel. Pacing is how fast things happen and when they and a good writer knows how not to rush and how not to drag a story on and generally, fillers drag a story on and are just unneeded words that do absolutely nothing to move the plot forward. They just make the writer wordy. I know. I used to have all kinds of scenes and lines to make my word count longer, but in the end slowed the novel down. 

Trust me. The reader is more likely to get to the end without these pointless words and scenes because fillers slow the story down, makes the story seem to drag on and makes the reader say “Will they just hurry up and get to real story?” and while that tactic can work when you want to play with a reader and build the suspense, it’s like teasing a baby with a toy.

You act like you’re going to give it to them, the baby reaches for it, and you snatch it back. I guarantee you that after five minutes of this, that baby will be turning red from screaming and when they finally get the toy will throw it across the room. That’s what you’re doing to your reader. There’s only so much teasing a reader can take and fillers don’t do the job.

Then again, rushing to the end without enough setup also frustrates the reader because getting to the end is half the fun. It’s like a long drive to Chicago that we make ever year with no stops except the bathroom. Just straight driving for eight hours. That’s so not fun although the ending result may be satisfying. Then again, when we make just three or four stops along the way, it makes the ride more enjoyable.

See? There’s a delicate balance here. Too many fillers that don’t drive the plot and conflict forward, boring story and frustrated reader. Not enough stuff going on and it’s a pretty boring ride and the reader is left feeling unsatisfied.

How did Eclipse inspire this rant on word count, fillers, and pacing? Because Eclipse was just a big filler novel between New Moon and Breaking Dawn to me. As if it wasn’t clear that Bella chose Edward from the end of New Moon, and quite frankly, this choice between immortality and mortality was something that could have been incorporated in the second book to me and didn’t need an entire novel to be dedicated to it alone or if she wanted to do that, the thing with Jacob could have been left out. Not to mention that I got the sense that things were being made important to fit into the pacing that weren’t really important for the sake of the story. But that’s just me. Either way, it inspired this rant.