Writing syle ... exactly what is it?

Your writing style is your unique writer's voice -- and flaws here are the hardest things of all to find and correct, because these are most often "spoken language" traits, "habits of speech." They pass over into the written word, where they don't belong, and where they glare off the page sounding clumsy, awkward, or just plain weird.

There is no five-minute fix for this point of copy editing, but many years ago a slim little book was written, Elements of Style. In 1918, William Strunk Jr., an English professor, attempted to touch down on every essential element and explain it with examples. In the following 90 years, the work has been revised several times; it was released into the public domain in 1995, and at the time of this writing you can buy it on paper (Macmillan, New York), or download it as an ebook.

Stay on this page, and a little further down, we'll lift the cover and take a peek into Strunk's slim volume.

Some errors of style are colloquialisms, or regionalisms — slang terms from a geographical area which don't mean much, a hundred miles away. For instance:

A "buttie" and a "sarnie" are the same thing. A sandwich. But only in the UK. "Miffed" means annoyed, so long as you're in the US. "Chuntering" is a cross between grumbling and chattering ... in the UK. "Chooks and snags and keks" are chickens and sausages and eggs ... so long as you're in Australia. "Pollies" could be parrots or politicians, depending on where you are. "Singlets and beanies" are undershirts and woollen hats ... in Australia. "Sourdoughs and Cheechakos" are terms making perfect sense, in Alaska! "Pootling" is a verb meaning "to drive slowly" or wander about at leisure ... in London.

So, watch out for colloquialisms and regionalisms in your narrative. You can use them in dialog, where they're important in the development of your character's unique voice. So long as the meaning is either contextually clear, or you make it clear, this is the place to use colloquialisms. It's when they escape into the narrative that the problem begins!

However, most errors of style that come out at the copy editing stage are speech patterns which don't work on paper. A good example of this is the passive voice. In speech, you can get away with using the passive voice; it sounds absolutely normal: "Insufficient time is being spent on the problem," is perfectly normal in speech.

However, agents, editors and publishers want the active voice, virtually to the exclusion of all else. In the active voice you would say, "The problem is being neglected."

Look at these examples of active and passive; sort them out and see the way to navigate through these rapids:

Passive:
The river was being progressively polluted by farming along both banks.
Active:
Farmer along both banks of the river were progressively polluting it.

Passive:
The little boy was brought to school by his father.
Active:
The man brought his little boy to school.

Passive:
The book had been read by a thousand students.
Active:
A thousand students had read the book.

Passive:
The intruder was mauled by three guard dogs.
Active:
Three guard dogs mauled the intruder.

Passive:
Maureen was made a fool of by Uncle Arthur.
Active:
Uncle Arthur made a fool of Maureen.

Here's the trick: look for the verb. (Above, the verbs are bring read, maul, make, and "progressively pollute.") Look for who performs the verb. Reword the sentence to make sure that the subject is actually performing the verb:

Passive: The cat was rescued by two young girls.
Verb: rescue.
The girls performed the rescue, not the cat!
The verb was performed ON the cat -- he was rescued!
Therefore,
Active: Two young girls rescued the cat.

Editors are quite strict about this point. It's usually active voice or the rejection pile.

Watch out particularly for catch phrases. For instance, "A fine performance was given by all concerned," sounds fine in your ear, but on paper, editors want to see the active voice: "All concerned delivered fine performances."

Copy editing is the time to be thorough, and meticulous ... and to know the rules.

Another excellent example of an error of style is to overindulge in "wordiness." When we're speaking, our speech patterns govern how we talk, describe things, relate other conversations, and, again, we can get away with almost anything. However, in text, wordiness soon becomes apparent. Your copy editing will be an interesting experience for some time, as you discover how to weed passages like this:

I was told by one of the teachers that Roger is a much better than average student with a fairly good attitude toward the other children in the class, and, in reality, the only area in which his behavior is below-par would have to be his hobby, which — it would be absolutely accurate to say — is inclined to make rather a mess.

Try this:

Roger's teacher says he is a good student who responds well to classmates, though his hobby makes a mess.

The simplest rule is: never use five words to say what you can say in three! (Editors and agents can spot this at a glance, and they will know (or think) your work is padded out to make a short story much longer. Some magazines pay by the word, and even though its only 3c or 5c per word, if you can sprawl the story out over an extra thousand words, you just picked up another fifty dollars! Expect strict editing from magazines that pay by the word, for obvious reasons.)

Literally hundreds of bad speech habits shadow every word we speak aloud, and none of them matters because the spoken word vanishes into the ether. The trouble starts when they're written down. They come back to haunt us. For this reason, political speeches are written long ahead of time, by professional speech writers!

Having said all this, it is also very important to find your own unique "voice" as a writer, and hang onto it. If 250 different writers were to obey every rule of the little book Elements of Style, they would sound almost identical.

This might be fine for academic writing -- but not for fiction, where it's a writer's unique treatment of words, sentences, dialog, narrative, discription, that go together to make successful fiction happen. We don't want or need romances, westerns, historicals and science fiction to all sound alike!

Copy editing is a process in which you must use your judgement. Don't get so wordy that editors and agents constantly reject you ... at the same time, don't let adherence to the Elements of Style strangle out either your voice or your creativity.

At times in this area of copy editing, it will be as if you're walking on a tightrope. When you begin to feel overwhelmed, STOP. Instead of editing yourself to death, or rewriting for the tenth time, go for a walk. Put on some music. Make coffee (apple tea will also get your brain going). Put your feet up. Pick up a couple of dozen books by other writers, in your genre, if you're writing in a niche. READ. See how other writers express themselves by flipping through the books and touching down on a paragraph here and there. You're not looking at the story or the character development, or the descriptive narrative. You're looking at the flow of words.

And some of the time, you're going to see thoroughly sloppy writing. Best-selling writers are allowed to break the rules. When you're breaking into the industry at the bottom, you have to know what the rules are, and play by them. However, if you pick up a dozen books and read a few pages here and there, you'll see some extremely good writing, as well as dross.

Be analytical. Try to key, or focus, on what these writers are doing that works, and works well. See if you can get into the habit of writing concisely. If not, fall back on copy editing to prune, or weed, sentences which are too wordy. The more you do this, the easier it will become. Eventually, you'll be able to do it without even thinking about it.

Errors in style ... the Elements of Style ... is an absolutely vast subject. An in-depth study would take a whole book, and indeed, entire books have been devoted to this topic. Copy editing, as a job, involves knowing most of the rules and making personal judgements: where do you conform to the rulebook? Where do you diverge, to protect your unique writing style?


William Strunk Jr.'s Elements of Style is the skinny volume we recommend. In the space of around 110pp, he looks are every imaginable awkward use of the language and, through the means of examples, smooths out the wrinkles.

Here's an example:

Keep related words together.

The position of the words in a sentence is the principal means of showing their relationship. The writer must therefore, so far as possible, bring together the words, and groups of words, that are related in thought, and keep apart those which are not so related.

The subject of a sentence and the principal verb should not, as a rule, be separated by a phrase or clause that can be transferred to the beginning.

Poor
Wordsworth, in the fifth book of The Excursion, gives a minute description of this church.

Better
In the fifth book of The Excursion, Wordsworth gives a minute description of this church.

Poor
Cast iron, when treated in a Bessemer converter, is changed into steel.

Better
By treatment in a Bessemer converter, cast iron is changed into steel.

The objection is that the interposed phrase or clause needlessly interrupts the natural order of the main clause. This objection, however, does not usually hold when the order is interrupted only by a relative clause or by an expression in apposition. Nor does it hold in periodic sentences in which the interruption is a deliberately used means of creating suspense (see examples under Rule 18).

The relative pronoun should come, as a rule, immediately after its antecedent.

Poor
There was a look in his eye that boded mischief.

Better
In his eye was a look that boded mischief.

Poor
He wrote three articles about his adventures in Spain, which were published in Harper's Magazine.

Better
He published in Harper's Magazine three articles about his adventures in Spain.

Poor
This is a portrait of Benjamin Harrison, grandson of William Henry Harrison, who became President in 1889.

Better
This is a portrait of Benjamin Harrison, grandson of William Henry Harrison. He became President in 1889.

If the antecedent consists of a group of words, the relative comes at the end of the group, unless this would cause ambiguity.

Poor
A proposal to amend the Sherman Act, which has been variously judged

Better
A proposal, which has been variously judged, to amend the Sherman Act

Poor
The grandson of William Henry Harrison, who

Better
William Henry Harrison's grandson, Benjamin Harrison, who

Modifiers should come, if possible next to the word they modify. If several expressions modify the same word, they should be so arranged that no wrong relation is suggested.

Poor
All the members were not present.

Better
Not all the members were present.

Poor
He only found two mistakes.

Better
He found only two mistakes.

Poor
Major R. E. Joyce will give a lecture on Tuesday evening in Bailey Hall, to which the public is invited, on "My Experiences in Mesopotamia" at eight P. M.

Better
On Tuesday evening at eight P. M., Major R. E. Joyce will give in Bailey Hall a lecture on "My Experiences in Mesopotamia." The public is invited.

...and so on! The book is very "dense," meaning Strunk doesn't waffle on. He jumps directly from one sin to another, deals with each in a minimum of words and proceeds to the next. The book is invaluable if you're still in the stage where you're learning to analyze the language ... perhaps trying to figure our which combination of words is actually correct. If you're "playing by ear," this is the book for you.

You can actually download it: Click here to do just that! However, a book is so nice to have on the shelf, and you can also order it from Amazon.com, using the button to your left.

If Elements of Style sounds too dense -- too hard -- then by all means stay on this blog and check out a number of other posts. We're covering the same ground, but we're doing it with a coffee in one hand and a cookie in the other...!

Here are some more posts which will help you work out what Style is all about, and get it under control:

Being wordy: how much is too much?!

Is B following A, and Z following Y ...?! Are you sure?!

Is there an echo in here?!

Writing with consistency

Writing with absolute clarity

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Story writing... where do you start?

Story writing can certainly begin with short pieces, but it's not essential. Many writers feel more confident of writing short stories first. Because they're short, they'll be finished quickly! Also, when you're learning to edit it can be very daunting to see a ream-sized stack of paper and know you have to work through the whole, book-length manuscript. A short piece is less overwhelming.

Much depends on your own courage as you tackle your early projects. Story writing is as demanding as painting, sculpting, playing an instrument. Do you have the love of what you do, can you make the commitment to work the number of hours needed to finish a novel?

If you love writing and are never happier than when you're fiddling with editing and propelling your characters into this or that hair-raising situation, there is a much better question. We shouldn't be asking if you 'can' write a novel. Of course you can. Who's going to stop you? The only thing to impede you will be your own boredom, which is not likely to happen, because you enjoy writing the same way someone else enjoys baseball.

The question is: which form of story writing suits your plot line?

You'll be looking at your notes — the plot outline you wrote, when you were hit by the plot ideas for your new work. You'll read through them, and in your mind you'll go over how much space, how many pages, it should take to do justice to each plot element without over-doing it.

You don't want to over-write. You also don't want to under-write. You're aiming for the 'just right' mark, which is somewhere between the two. Your writer's instinct will tell you when you hit the mark. If it doesn't, or if you're 'off,' a good beta reader will tell you where the book is 'too long' or 'too short.' This instinct is one of the skills you soon develop in the art of story writing. Don't worry, it'll soon come to you.

So, here's the question: do you have enough material to make for a novel of at least 45,000 words? That's a very short novel. In fact, it's probably too short for most non-pulp publishers to consider. They would be looking for something at least 80,000 words, and on up to a maximum of perhaps 160,000 words.

(You won't know what they want until you visit their website in search of information, or write to them with an initial query. You can do this before you begin to write, if you feel that your book is really only suited to one publisher. Caveat: if your book has such a narrow playing field, you might have a problem. If you're writing to earn royalties, narrow-interest subjects don't make for big sales ... and you only get paid when you sell copies.)

If you don't have enough material for a novel, then you're looking at a short story. Writing a novel around too little material involves padding out the themes. Extremely good writers can do this, and get away with it; but critics and editors can almost always see what was done. If the book seems to be padded out, an editor could easily reject it for this.

'Padding' is largely irrelevant material that's pushed in between the 'real' scenes to make the book longer. It can take the form of 'character development,' or a sub-plot, but if the scenes stray too far off-topic, they're likely to be deleted by your pro editor before publication.

Here's the downside: if the editorial cuts make the book too short ... the fact you padded it out to get a novel becomes obvious. You actually had the material for a short story! Writing to please editors should always be in the back of your mind.

If you have the material for a novel — go for it. Understand the time it will take to write so much, and then edit and proofread. Do it for the love of writing. Fall in love with your characters and situations, dive into the realm you've created, and play! Story writing should not be about work. It should be 70% play, 20% natural skill (all of which you can develop on this site), and 10% work. We should be able to survive 10% work.

If you don't have the material for a whole novel, you know right now, you're writing a novella or a short story. Writing in the shorter formats is quite different from writing novels. It's actually a unique discipline. You approach the writing style differently, the characters tend to be created differently, events are described differently, in a short piece. (Story writing has its 'departments,' just as picture painting can involve oils, acrylics, watercolors, pastels, mixed media.)

To get a feel for short story writing, read some. Look at anthologies and fiction magazines, find a writer whose work you like and respect ... and pick his or her brains. Be analytical. Can you see what the writer did, and how? Take the the story apart and put it back together. Where is the beginning, what's the McGuffin? At what point does Jack get up in the tree?

Is it easier to get published with a short story? Possibly ... which doesn't mean it's simple, or a dead cert! Writing for professional magazines is a field which obeys its own ground rules, and you'll need to do your research there, just as you would before you approached a book published. Short fiction is often generic — science fiction, crime, mystery, horror, romance.

There are magazines and ezines devoted to many niches. You'll need to find the best place to send your material, query the publisher to discover exactly what they want in a story. Writing according to the guidelines you receive provides your best shot at getting into print. (It's also very true that some very nice royalty rates are paid for short story writing at the professional level, whereas entry-level authors of full novels can be surprised by the modest nature of the first check.)

Do you have to start with short stories? No. But be sure you have enough material for a novel, and be sure you have the time and patience to write, edit and proofread a whole novel. You might find that you enjoy the short story writing experience so much, you stay with it. Some writers rarely produce novels.

Story writing demands as much of you as learning to dance or play the flute. The trick is to enjoy the process as much as the contracts at the end of the road!

Getting paid to write

When and how does a freelancer get paid to write?

Freelance writers "do it backwards" — you'll be paid to write after you've finished. When you make the sale, you'll be offered a contract for the piece. How much you'll be paid depends on what the work is, and who you're selling it to, plus how well known you are, and just how good your current project is.

Markets for fiction are very broad and tremendously varied. You can sell to conventional (print media) magazines and book publishers ... as a freelance writer you can also sell to electronic publishers, whose magazines appear online; you can get a contract from an ezine publisher; and in the early days of your career, you can submit to semi-professional publishers. More on this below.

Getting paid to write is one thing; getting paid well is a goal to aim for. Like any other art, the more famous you are (which, for a writer, comes down to how many people have read your material, liked it, and will pay good money to read more), and the better you perform, the more compensation you'll be offered.

In the early days, when you're completely unknown, your name can't be used by a publisher as a 'hook' to sell more copies. As you go on and make several sales, your name will become known. Readers who liked your previous work will be 'hooked' to buy a volume (anthology, magazine, or even a whole novel) in which you appear. You can get paid to write while you develop the name that will earn you the big checks later.

At the outset, however, you're the classic unknown quantity, and a publisher must take a risk on you. He or she is going to pay you money on a guess that readers will like your work. This guess is based on how well the staff at the publisher's office liked it. Did you hold their attention? Make them laugh, or cry? Did your story haunt them for days after they finished reading?

Other factors also come into play when a publisher is deciding whether to accept or reject the work of a freelance writer. How commercial is the piece you're submitting? How relevant is it to the publication? How original is it? And how well is it written?

If a piece is 100% relevant, addresses current, popular subjects, has a good streak of originality and is quite well written, you're in with a chance of achieving your first goal: actually get paid to write! And the first time you get a check (or cheque, depending on which part of the world you come from) is a thrill.

'Quite well written' means the editor will have to do some work on your writing to bring it up to full professional standard. If your material is original enough, relevant and commercial, he or she will happily spend several hours going over your story, with a line-by-line edit. (Several hours?! You echo, dismayed. Why is editing necessary? Who should do it — and when? Click here to learn more about what a professional edit entails, and why it can take some time.)

Naturally, the less editing you need, the less time an editor needs to spend on you prior to publishing ... the more time you save him, the more he'll approve of your material, and the more likely you are to get the sale ... in other words, get paid to write. So it behooves you to write very well! Which is the whole topic of our WRITE! segment.

How much you finally do get paid to write depends on how much of the editor's time you consumed, to get your work up to standard ... how relevant and commercial it is, and if you've made sales before (meaning, do readers know you? Will you attract them, and enhance sales for this publisher. Everyone's bottom line is financial, the publisher's as well as yours).

When you make your first sale, don't expect a vast check. If you're selling to high-end popular magazine, they'll adhere to their industry pay scales, which can be quite generous. But regional magazines, small papers, small(er) publishers, don't make the kind of sales the big boys (and girls) do, and can't pay as much.

Inquire about pay scales at the time you contact the editor, asking if he or she wants to read your work. Some very small magazine publishers might even pay in copies, not cash. Others might pay half a penny per word, or a penny per word, which is a bare fraction of the industry freelance rate. They should be up front about what they intend to pay; if you get the impression something is being hidden — it probably is.

It is practically impossible to put a dollar amount on how much you can expect to be paid to write, because the market is so wide and every publisher is different. For example, if you're submitting to an anthology, you might receive $20 - $500, depending on how long your story runs, how many copies the publisher intends to print, how well known you are, and how well patronized the genre is at this moment.

(For instance, science fiction is a quite popular genre. For a brand-new writer, a major SF publishing house might run 7,000 - 20,000. However, a small SF publishing house would have to 'play it safe' and might run 3,000 - 7,000. Actual dollar amounts for a freelancer's payment are impossible to predict; but you can see the margins you're working inside of.)

Publishers can be reluctant to disclose the size of the printrun, and this is their prerogative. Also, the printrun can be changed, for reasons of economic pressure. Something planned as 6,000 can ultimately be cut to 4,000, not because of the quality of your work, but for multiple other reasons of business. You may never know how exactly many copies were printed.

A small 'literary' publisher might run 3,000 copies of a book. A genre publisher might run five or six thousand for the first printrun, and if it goes well, organize a reprint, in which case, you get paid again ... without having to write a word. (Getting paid to write just got sweeter!) A publisher working in a larger niche might print 10,000 - 25,000. However, if you've been thinking all books are printed and sold in the tens of thousands, and the millions — this is only true of national bestsellers.

Suffice to say, as a freelance, you finish the work and then contact editors and offer it to them. Talk to the big guys first (they pay the best), but be happily surprised if you get a solicitation from them. Remember, everyone goes to them first (because they pay more!) so they're usually buried in queries and submissions. After the submission, and the acceptance, you'll receive a contract and a financial offer. Ah! The 'get paid to write' scenario is happening!

How much money is in the offing is another question. As a freelance, you're not compelled to accept a publisher's offer, but before you turn it down, consider several points. You're a newcomer, an unknown quantity. Your work might genuinely need some editing to get it up to full-professional standard for publication, and editing takes time. (You'll learn about this at firsthand as you read through our EDIT! segment.)

As Benjamin Franklin said, "Time is money," and an editor's time is especially precious. If your editor is willing to accept your work even though it needs to be polished, don't be insulted (much less angered) by the editing. It's actually a compliment. Your originality is being praised. You're being accepted for publication, even though your writing needs a lick of polish.

How much work will an editor do for you, and still publish you? It all depends on how much he or she wants the story! If you're good enough, and original enough, some editors will invest an astonishing amount of effort. (But you'll woo more editors, and get paid to write more often, if your work is already is wearing a shining coat of polish before you submit.)

Still, past a certain point, you could be asked for a rewrite, especially if the editing that's deemed necessary is more to do with 'story editing' than 'copy editing.' What's the difference? We get to the nitty-gritty part in the EDIT! segment.

So judge the offer a publisher makes you on its own merits, your merits, and the publisher's merits, before you turn it down. Are you selling to a small(er) publisher, who will do a small(ish) printrun? Are you still largely unknown? Does the work need some polishing? (The hardest question is, 'Am I good enough to be paid to write?' It's a tough one to answer for oneself.)

If the answers to some or all of these questions is 'yes', then work with your editors, not against them. The sale will get you a modest check and, much more importantly, it'll get you a professional credit. Your 'track record' has begun.

In the early days, it's not about earning a lot of money. Being paid to write is always nice, but the fat checks probably won't materialize until you're well known, and your work is so highly-polished at the time of submission, your editor had better put the cap back on his 'blue pen' before it dries up! (The traditional editor's tool is the blue pen, or pencil.)

Make your name in your genre with some good, solid early sales. These books or stories will be reviewed in the media (online or print; the Internet is equally valuable these days), and if your reviews are good ... they will be if you and your material are up to snuff! ... you can work your way up the freelance ladder surprisingly quickly, getting paid to write more often, and in larger amounts.

Then a day arrives when you find a publisher's letter in your mailbox. They're soliciting for material — actually asking you to send them something! Anything you submit following this letter has crossed the line from a freelance submission to a contractual relationship.

If you've been asked for a book, you can expect to get an advance on royalties. You'll be paid before you write! You might not be getting rich yet, but the pleasure you'll feel will be worth a million bucks. Getting paid to write is the bottom line for all writers. Being asked for a book is a ticket to our seventh heaven. And it happens, if you're good enough — and you will be.

On a closing note, your very earliest submissions might be made to semi-professional publications. Some pay; others don't. If you're drawing a blank elsewhere, can't get a solicitation to make a submission, don't close the door on these publishers. In the opening phases of your career, being paid to write is only half if the equation. You also need to learn, and build your credentials.

Semi-professional editors are often highly-skilled, and they publish for the sheer love of what they do. You can learn a lot, and some of the magazines, ezines and books coming out of these APA (Amateur Press Association) offices can be quite prestigious. You can start building your 'track record' long before you start to earn, and build up both your skills and experience along the way. You may not get paid to write in cold, hard cash, but experience and education are invaluable.

The very best APA publications are often seen by professional editors. An editor spots you in those pages, likes your material. When he or she receives your query letter, you're already a known quantity. You can sneak in through the door right there.