Inventing Reality Editing Service Blog

One of the quickest ways to ruin a story’s texture is to repeat the same word between sentences and paragraphs. For example:

Koorana quivered as Birray’s scent grew stronger than ever before, so strong that the teenager thought it entwined with her very blood. For a teenage male with such wide shoulders he possessed the sweetest smile, she mused, and so tall, too. He motioned to look up, and Koorana realized everyone else in the tent was standing. She broke her stare, quickly stood. Averting her eyes to the dirt ground beneath them, Koorana vowed to concentrate on the service, but a moment later she allowed herself one last look at Birray. He was still staring at her and winked. The teenager turned back, happy, and even in the dim light could see the flowers adorning the altar.

Notice how some words, particularly “teenager” and its variant “teenage” are repeated? The paragraph could be improved by eliminating two of the three uses of that word, perhaps by replacing the first “teenager” with a synonym such as “adolescent” and simply using the pronoun “she” for “The teenager” in the last sentence.

Flaubert recommended never using a word more than once on a single page, but I consider that a bit extreme. After all, sometimes repeating the word is necessary for rhetorical effect. Consider this passage:

“Do you realize how complex living things are?” the gobena said from the revival’s dais. The crowd’s eyes clung to him despite the heat exacerbated by the tent walls’ dark hadrosaur hide. “Do you realize how complex a family is, with all of its interactions and behaviors? But some say life is no more difficult to make than the simple whistles of an ugly scrubfowl.”

The audience laughed. “How could organs as complicated as the eye or the ear or the brain of even a tiny bird ever come about by chance or natural processes?” the gobena continued. “How could a family?”

The gobena’s speech harkens to that of a revivalist and thus seems more real when the phrases “Do you realize how complex” and “How could” are repeated.

Another acceptable practice for repetition is when using an invisible word, like “the”, “and” or “said”. In the preceding passage, “the” was used 11 times, though you probably didn’t notice it.
Beyond these instances, however, avoiding repetition of words is advisable.

Visit my Web site about writing science fiction, Inventing Reality.
(c) 2008 Rob Bignell

Tags: invisible word, repetition, rhetorical effect, style, texture

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Have you ever wondered why some television characters always wear the same clothes? Gilligan of “Gilligan’s Island” always dons his red shirt and white cap while Fred Flintstone always wears a spotted leopard’s wool. Such characters appear less real because in the everyday world, people wear different clothes from day to day.

Likewise, you don’t want your characters to always refer back to one another with the exact same word throughout your story, particularly in a novel. Such a word is called a “referent”.

In the real world, different people refer to us in different ways. Suppose your name is Amanda Philips. Your co-workers might call you “Amanda”, your close friends “Mandy”, your significant other “Snookums”, your professional contacts “Ms. Phillips”, your kid sister “Manda”, etc.

Consider how “Star Trek: The Original Series” handled referents for its characters, particularly Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott. Captain Kirk and Dr. McCoy refer to him as “Scotty”. Mr. Spock calls him “Mr. Scott.” Others call him “Engineer Scott.” This is a realistic way of handling referents.

Visit my Web site about writing science fiction, Inventing Reality.
(c) 2008 Rob Bignell

Tags: characters, dialogue, referents, style

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Sometimes the only purpose of a story’s sentence is to say that nothing happened. Such sentences are called “nulls”. An example would be the sentence “He said nothing.” Fortunately, nulls are easy to spot: if your story were occurring in real life, nulls would be the points where nothing happens. Nulls can be deleted from the story. They slow down the piece’s immediacy and dramatic tension.

Tags: dialogue, dramatic tension, nulls, style

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Tight writing is using the minimum number of words necessary to convey an idea or to describe an event. Writing tightly allows your text to be punchier and for the plot to move more quickly. At the very least, tight writing reduces your word count, allowing you to spend more words on text that truly advances your story’s or builds dramatic tension.

Here’s a list of common expressions , which I’ve run into during my years of editing, that should be tightened.

“a blonde girl”

Just write “blonde”; a male with light-colored hair is “blond” (no “e”)

“knelt down”

Just write “knelt”; the act of kneeling implies one is going downward

“nods his head up and down”

Just write “nods”; this gesture alone indicates the head is moving up and down

“nods yes” or “nods to the affirmative”

Just write “nods”; this gesture alone means “yes” or indicates agreement

“shakes his head no” or “shakes his head to the negative”

Just write “shakes his head”; this gesture alone means “no” or indicates disagreement

“stood up”

Just write “stood”; the act of standing implies one is rising

“the two of us”

Just write “we”

“they both”; “we both”

Just write “we” or “they”; the pronoun already implies both characters

“was nodding”

Just write “nodded”; see entry on active vs. passive voice

“were wearing”

Just write “wore”; see entry on active vs. passive voice

“with a smile on her face”

Just write “with a smile”; a smile couldn’t be anywhere else but on a face (unless we’re talking alien life forms)

Tags: style, tight writing

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