Here are some tricks of the editing trade that will make your writing look more polished instantly.<\/p>\n
Trick #1:<\/strong> Use concrete rather than vague language.<\/p>\n Example of vague language:<\/strong> The weather was of an extreme nature.<\/p>\n Example of concrete language:<\/strong> Thunderstorms tore open the sky, bringing a deluge of rain. <\/p>\n Which sentence would make you want to continue reading?<\/p>\n Trick #2:<\/strong> Try active voice instead of passive voice.<\/p>\n Passive Voice:<\/strong> The ball was hit.<\/p>\n Active Voice:<\/strong> Barry hit the ball.<\/p>\n With active voice, the reader knows who did what, which is always more interesting.<\/p>\n Trick #3:<\/strong> Avoid overusing there is\/are<\/em> and that is\/was<\/em>.<\/p>\n Example overusing there is<\/em>:<\/strong> There is a case of meningitis that was reported in the newspaper.<\/p>\n Better Example:<\/strong> A case of meningitis was reported in the newspaper.<\/p>\n Notice how eliminating there is<\/em> also eliminated that was<\/em>. However, this sentence is still in passive voice.<\/p>\n Best Example:<\/strong> The newspaper reported a case of meningitis.<\/p>\n Active voice makes the sentence less clumsy and more direct.<\/p>\n Trick #4:<\/strong> Convey ideas with one positive rather than two negatives.<\/p>\n Example with two negatives:<\/strong> Sam is not unwilling to do the report.<\/p>\n Unless you want to convey hesitation on the part of Sam, use the positive approach.<\/p>\n Better Example: <\/strong>Sam is willing to do the report.<\/p>\n Trick #5:<\/strong> Notice parallel construction.<\/p>\n Incorrect Example:<\/strong> Winning is the goal but to play fair is important too.<\/p>\n Correct Example:<\/strong> Winning is the goal but playing fair is important too.<\/p>\n By pairing playing with winning, you give the sentence balance.<\/p>\n Effective writing techniques are not mysterious. Use them and your writing will sparkle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Here are some tricks of the editing trade that will make your writing look more polished instantly. Trick #1: Use concrete rather than vague language. Example of vague language: The weather was of an extreme nature. Example of concrete language: Thunderstorms tore open the sky, bringing a deluge of rain. Which sentence would make you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-effective-writing"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}