But there are other things besides extra words which will drag a good read down to a boring crawl. Lets look at a made up paragraph, and since I originally wrote this before the events in Iraq, let's say this in a time before the advent of modern transportation:

     Dawn found them in Baghdad! Their eyes were filled with the wonder of it (even though they had been sand blown), and it gave a "lift" to their spirits, which had been drastically, and almost permanently, seemingly totally depressed. They were still maybe two or three miles away, "as the crow flies," but somehow the fragrant smell of the city lovingly reached out to them, and the beauty of the city overwhelmed them till they were standing in "awe!"

     Okay, lets break it down.

     Parentheses are a lazy way of trying to shoehorn something into a sentence or paragraph that should have been dealt with before. It's like adding (this was before modern transportation) to the first sentence rather than setting it up in an explanation or in previous chapter, something called foreshadowing. Parentheses slow the flow, disturb the chain of thought, and I don't think have a place in fiction.

     The same with the words in quotes. If the word fits, the quotes are unnecessary, and if it doesn't, the quotes will only call attention to it.

     Look at the exclamation points. An occasional use, like three or four in a novel might work, but an exclamation point won't give punch to a sentence that lacks it.

     And there's all those clichés--as the crow flies and awe-- draining off any spontaneity we may have accidently stirred up. They are the hall mark of hackneyed writing. Clichés may work in dialogue, but in narration they give the impression of, "haven't I already read this?" This is especially true with agents and editors, BTW.

     Next, all those 'ly' adverbs and adjectives. They won't strengthen weak nouns or verbs, but will weaken strong ones.

     Notice also the generalities--one or two miles, fragrant smell--which really tell us little and show us nothing.

     Finally, let's not forget the beginning sentence which is archaic and a cliché and lacks punch, but which everyone thinks is arty: "Dawn found them in Baghdad."

     The cardinal sin is that the paragraph doesn't engage the reader. Let's see if we can straighten it out using our old friend, Oself, our other self, to give us focus:

     They galloped over a rise half a mile out of Baghdad. A pink dawn silhouetted its domes and minarets, turning the desert city into a promise of rebirth. Oself rubbed grit from his eyes as a breeze brought him the sweet fragrance of jasmine, enriched by the tart smoke from camel-dung fires. A cock's crow announced the day, and his doubts slipped away with the shadows of night.

     Okay doky, lets break this down and compare paragraphs.

     Instead of the passive ho-humer, "dawn found them," we have an action to engage the reader. Something is going on. What is it? We further engage the reader by painting the picture of Baghdad. And we eliminate any possible confusion by the mention of it being a desert city. Confuse them and we'll will lose them.

     Instead of adverbs and adjectives, we try for strong verbs: silhouetted, brought, enriched, announced, slipped away.

     The "pink dawn" is coupled with the "promise of rebirth" to uplift our spirits w/o TELLING us how to feel. Trust your readers; give them the picture and let them interpret it.

     By replacing vagueness with the specific, we not only give authority to our narration, but we trigger responses in our reader's mind. "Fragrant smell" of the first paragraph tells us nothing, but jasmine and smoke and dung trigger remembered aromas in our minds. Also, why spend words on whether we're two or three miles out? We are the God of the story. Half a mile. That's it. Who's going to dispute us?

     Finally, by shifting emphasis from "They" to "Oself" in the third sentence, we allow our readers to experience Oself's mood shift and the reason for it, setting us up for the beginning of the next paragraph.

     Let's look back to the first example one more time. Notice the words 'seemingly, almost, and somehow?' Go back and look at them. In 'almost' every sentence where these words appear, you can leave them out w/o changing the meaning. They are nothing words along with "very" and "as you know." He was a very tall man. Tells us nothing. And "as you know" falls into the same category as the "it goes without saying" example we eliminated in BookMarc #20. If you already know "as you know," why do we need to say it? How about--he did it seemingly w/o effort. If we are the observer, he did it w/o effort.

     But the worst of these word-mongers is 'somehow,' because writers use it all the time, all the time. Am I repeating myself? "Somehow she knew someone was behind her." Bullshit. Give me something--"She smelled the reek of cigarettes and knew..." or even a vague "She felt another presence and turned..." Anything is better than somehow. How about, "she felt better somehow"? Doesn't it work just as well w/o "somehow?" What a lazy and hackneyed way to put it. Search for the word in your writing, and kill that sucker.

     Before quitting, let's talk a little bit about redundancy. Just like clichés, redundancy will rob our wringing of freshness. Hey, we've heard this before. When reading through your word, look for things that you've mentioned before. Especially in the same chapter. In critiquing a friend's manuscript I saw he mentioned a man's fighting ability four or five times in spaced out paragraphs. After pointing out to him, he copied all the paragraphs to a separate file and combined them all, eliminating repetition. This cut out a lot of words and effectively described the man's ability in one paragraph.

     If we learn from these examples, we'll end up far down the road to effective writing. Specifics for generalities. Active for passive. Experience through a character rather then telling. And reach for the right words, nouns and verbs, rather then accepting hackneyed clichés.

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     And remember: it's always better to light a candle in your mind by reading [Easy Reading Writing] than to curse the darkness of rejections. There is an easy order link to B&N to purchase the book.