I’m continuing with tips to trim excess words from manuscripts.

Beware adverbs and adjectives because they don’t paint vivid pictures. Talked loudly is not as specific as yelled or boomed or screeched. A better choice is to use a more precise noun or verb. Rather than modify every noun with an adjective and each verb with an adverb, choose a more precise noun or verb that is strong enough to stand alone and needs no modification. Remember the three-R rule: reduce, refine, or remove.

Limit detail. Is the shape of the character’s nose or the color of his hair relevant to the story? If not, cut it (the description, not the nose or hair). Readers enjoy creating their own mental pictures of the characters. In picture books, illustrations provide character details.

Is your dialog saying more than is needed? Dialog should promote the plot, reveal backstory or add character traits. If it’s doing more than that, the words are mere fluff and should be trimmed. Is the dialog providing information the reader already knows? Cut redundancy. Repeating information dulls the reading experience.

Deleting excess words as I am writing a scene is difficult for me. The trimming comes with revision, where removing the litter cleans the manuscript.

Call for Submissions for Young Writers:

Parallel Ink is your friendly international e-magazine for students, by students between the ages of 12- to 18-years-old. Besides sci-fi serials and fantasy fables, we welcome poignant poetry, quirky rants, discarded love letters, and offbeat text exchanges with open arms (among many other countless gems of literature teens write). We also accept art. Honestly, anything goes if it's creative, captivating, and ready for sending out into the world wide web!

Submission guidelines at http://parallel-ink.webs.com/

Call for Submissions for Adult Writers:

Third Flatiron Anthologies. "Ain't Superstitious" - Theme involving superstition, e.g., luck, prophecy, magic, rational and irrational thinking, Spinoza, dark times, black cats, Orpheus, the Flying Dutchman, Sleepy Hollow, Tam O'Shanter, astrology, witchcraft, etc.

Reading Period: May 1 - June 30, 2015
Writer Deadline: June 30, 2015
Publication Date: September 1, 2015

Submission guidelines at http://www.thirdflatiron.com/liveSite/

Trimming Excess Words

Today, I’m continuing my series on trimming excess words? Try these tips:

Read books in the same genre in which you’re writing to determine how and where longer descriptions work. Read a book first for the entertainment value. If you enjoyed it, read it again to analyze how long and short descriptions were woven into the story.

Read your work aloud and concentrate on the description. By reading aloud, your mind will be more attuned to awkward phrasing and will hone in on other mistakes, such as excessive use of words.

Avoid information dumping at the beginning of a story. Information dumping is offering too much information about a character or situation in the opening chapter. If you spend three pages telling why the character is upset, the reader will be even more upset. Long exposition slows and sometimes stops the action. Too much detail and backstory are not necessary and will fail to hook the reader.

Find useless words and zap them. Some useless words I am guilty of using are just, even, felt, like, really, seems, thought, very, that and more.

When my tummy turns queezy at the idea of cutting words, I remind myself that it’s not about the words, it’s about the story.

Next week, I’ll look at more ways to put your manuscript on a diet and achieve success.

Call for Submissions for Young Writers:

INSIGHT WRITING CONTEST—Deadline July 31, 2014. Categories are student short story,
general short story, and student poetry. Prizes range from $50 to $250. Winning entries will be published in Insight. You must be age 22 or under to enter the student categories. Short stories are limited to seven pages. Poetry is limited to one page.

Submission guidelines at http://www.insightmagazine.org/contest/rules.asp

Call for Submissions for Adult Writers:

Gotham Writers. It may be apocryphal, but the story goes that Ernest Hemingway won a bet by writing a short story that ran fewer than ten words. One version of the story places the bet at the famed Algonquin “round table.” Whether true or not, there is an actual bet-winning short story attributed to Hemingway:

For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn.

You have to admit it’s pretty good. It builds, and there’s a whole world of background and emotion lurking beneath those words.

We would like to make a similar bet with you. Write a great short story in ten words or fewer. (You may use a title, but that goes into the word count.) Submit it to our contest. Entry is free. Winner of the bet gets a free Gotham class.

We did this contest last year, and here’s the winner:

Remnants of beard peppered her sink. He left nothing else.
A. Crossley Spencer
Summerfield, North Carolina

The Details:

·        Submit an original, unpublished 10-word short story.

·        Entries must be submitted online by midnight Eastern Time, May 18, 2015. Only online entries will be accepted.

·        Entry is free. Limit one entry per person.

·        Entry must consist of no more than 10 words. You may use a title but that goes into the word count. Longer entries will be disregarded.

·        Entry must be original and unpublished.

·        Entries will be judged on originality, quality, spelling, and grammar.

·        Gotham will post the winning entry at GothamWriters.com

·        The winner will be notified by June 3, 2015.

Deadline: May 18, 2015.

Submission guidelines at http://www.writingclasses.com/ContestPages/10W.php