Revisions: The Small Things

Welcome back to the Writing Apothecary and the last lesson for revision. Last week was a big one and we’re following it up with the smaller things.  Life has been a bit hectic so this one is a little bit late, but better to be late than never!

First thing is first, reading your draft out loud, does wonders. You can find the natural pace of the dialogue and all of the words you’ve missed or misspelled. Because our eyes are trained to see what is there, even if we miss it. 

Without going into a lot of detail, because we are going to be covering editing – don’t worry there, we need to refine our writing before it gets to that point though. So let’s take a look at what we need to step into when we’re looking at the revisions of the smaller things. 

In this lesson we’re covering:

• Grammar and punctuation
• Mastering the imperfect perfect tense
• Metaphors
• Modifiers
• Clichés
• Attributions
• Simplifying your words

Revisions can go on and on and on. How do you know when you’re done with them? How do you know it’s ready for the next stage? 

And honestly? You will be able to remove yourself from the process. You’ll be able to look at the way that it works and the way that it all goes together. Stories are never finished and they will always need tweaking, even when you come back to them 10 years later and they’re published. This is the nature of our brains and you’ll need to counteract that with moving on to the next project.  

Your story will never please everyone and that’s ok. It has to make you happy and you have to have a steady belief in it. If you do. Nothing will be able to shake you. 

Book References:

• Eats, shots and leaves – Lynne Truss
• The Elements of Style –  William Strunk and E.B. White

Tell me what did you take away from this week’s lesson? I’d love to know.

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