AKA: Tightening your word count
For those of you who might find yourself wanting to slice words off your manuscript for one reason or another.
Please note that all of these tips should be used in moderation and are not right for every situation. They're designed to give you ideas about what to look for when you're tightening your word count! This is not designed to be a commentary on different writing styles. This is for the person who needs to be under 3000 or 92000 or 750 words and they're a few over. Or, for the person who is trying to make their story subtly stronger.
Small words add up fast.
There are several words small enough to escape detection because they're so simple and fundamental to story telling. Often people skip over their elimination because they are core words, the foundation of our structured sentences. If you're looking to shave down your word count or tighten your manuscript for any reason, it never hurts to try and eliminate the small stuff first, because these words are relatively meaningless on their own. Your story's integrity will not be compromised.
Just keep in mind that you will need to re-write a sentence here and there. We're trying to shorten sentences, and that might mean finding a stronger/more specific word or eliminating part of a line!
Some of these small words: The, a, an, at, of, then, that, up, down, out, in, and, to, with.
[The] General —-> General Washington (no word cut; just an example of being specific)
Got [up] —-> Stood
Crouched [down] —-> Crouched (crouching typically means going down)
...kissed her lips and [then] traced her cheek —-> kissed her lips and traced her cheek. (Can't do both actions at the same time? You may need two sentences.)
The trip took [a long time] —-> Hours
Betsy wrapped the flag around her shoulders. George stared [at her.] —-> George stared.
...[the stripes were the color of blueberries and] intersected —-> blueberry stripes intersected...
If these examples were from the same story, we've just cut about 11-12 words without having to agonize over deleting an entire sentence or two! Cutting out the words may not be a big deal, but you're literally saving the reader a few seconds and thus making your work a faster read. The stripes are still blueberry. You still crouched. He still kissed/traced.
As you can see from the examples, sometimes just the small word can be cut; other times a stronger or more specific word can be used, or a part of the line can be entirely reworked.
Don't Verb-to something!
Quick and clean trick to shaving off a few precious words. Don't have your character verb-to something. Just have them verb.
Examples:
Matthew began to sing—-> sang
Mark started to work —-> worked
Luke tried to reach —-> reached
John's feet seemed to dance —-> danced
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