3 Simple Ways to Take Your Book From Good to Great Today
3 Simple Ways to Take Your Book From Good to Great Today
Simple fixes to whet a publisher's appetite
If you're working on a book, you're probably anxious for it to be as good as possible. And for good reason! Of course, the quality of your work is your calling card. But even in an early draft, the difference between good writing and excellent writing could also be the difference between a publisher taking a chance on your story and sending back a disappointing, barely-polite "No, thanks."
No pressure, right? It's only your whole writing career! Luckily, there are a few things you can do right now, on your own, that will lift your book out of the overflowing "Maybe?" pile and into the much shorter stack labelled "Wow!" Read on for three simple hints that make a big difference.
1) Finish what you start.
Do you have a character making herself a cup of coffee? Great! It's relatable, and it gives her something to do while she has an important conversation or waits around for the phone to ring. But if you write that, you've got to show her then drinking the coffee - or forgetting all about it once the action starts. What you can't do is forget all about it yourself.
Part of the tension of a good scene is the reader's familiarity with at least half of what's going on. That comfort level acts like an anchor: it gives your reader a secure base from which to explore scenery, characters, or sequences of events they either don't know much about or cannot predict.
And processes make terrific anchors! Starting up the car and driving to a destination, ordering and then eating a lunch, cleaning a bathroom: whatever action is happening your scene makes a great vehicle for the plot. But the reader expects to pass the benchmarks that they know. If these are neglected, your reader feels unsettlingly adrift - as if they don't quite follow what they're reading.
So make sure you continue to check in with your anchoring device. Have your character sip her coffee a few times throughout the scene. Have the person driving the car flip on the turn signal and change lanes. Have them nibble their Caesar salad and sip their iced tea; have them wipe down the sink, then the toilet, then the bathtub - and then throw away their trash.
If you're intentionally cultivating a sense of disconnect in your reader, that changes things slightly. But in either case, if you start a process and then abandon it without acknowledging why, it looks like sloppy, forgetful writing.
2) Quit repeating the same word all the time.
So the perfect word for your character's loud, jovial voice is "booming." Terrific! You've hit the nail on the head. But what you may not realize is that you get exactly two chances to use that perfect word, all throughout your whole book. And the two usages can't be anywhere near each other! You've got to find a synonym, or evoke the booming sound a different way.
Why? Because it stands out like a sore thumb.
Imagine you frequently see a certain neighbor when she's out walking her dog. Normally, all you notice is her smiling face and the adorable pup. But one day, you notice she's wearing a pair of lime-green leggings. "Wow," you think. "That's certainly ... a choice!"
For the next two weeks, your neighbor wears normal pants - black or gray; you don't notice them. But then, on the 15th day, she's got on the lime-green ones again. In your mind, she's become "the woman with the lime-green pants," even though she doesn't actually wear them very often. She has the dog every day, after all, but what you noticed was her pants.
It's the same with that perfect adjective or verb, especially if it's unusual. Sure, the manuscript is full of dozens of instances where you've described the guy's voice another way. But what the reader will perceive is that you keep saying "booming."
And it's not just distinctive words! Common terms stick out when they're overused, too. Got someone driving? Don't say "the car" three times in one paragraph. You could say "the Honda" or "the sedan," you could resort to "her vehicle" or even "his whip" - or better yet, you could just restructure the sentence in a way that lets you sidestep that repetitive usage.
It's cold out? Don't say "the air," "the air," "the air." Try "the breeze," or maybe "the chill." Even "the brisk early morning" is better than constantly repeating "the air." Otherwise, it reads like you either have no clue how your words will sound in the reader’s mind, or you can't even be bothered to keep track of what you're doing.
Neither of those impressions is good.
3) Vary the lengths of your sentences and paragraphs.
Have you ever ordered a meal at a restaurant and taken a moment just to gaze at how stunning it was, before you were ready to dive in? That's because presentation matters: the main point of a eating meal is to take in nourishment. But what really entices you is more than that. When food goes beyond utility into beauty, well, it's then that you can call it art.
And we value that! Otherwise, we might just as well eat a sloppy bowl of plain old beans. It'll do in a pinch, but it's so much nicer when the food is, well, nicer! It's the same with writing.
We can take in written information no matter how engagingly it's presented. But how pleasant that process is, and how willing we are to continue it, is up to you as the writer.
Your reader wants to keep wanting more of your story. The way to keep your audience hanging on your every word is to shake up the ways you present those words.
First, you need paragraphs of varying lengths. Some will be long, yes, but some ought to be quite short. Every time you change the subject, you should strongly consider starting a new line. Be mindful of your placement, too. You don't want to start a new chapter with a formidable, long wall of text. You should also leave as the last line anything you especially want to emphasize.
Next, you need those paragraphs to be made up of sentences of different lengths. Don't let yourself say "and" more than twice in one sentence. And don't be afraid of short, choppy sentences! Situated unexpectedly in the middle of a long passages, where they work to reset the reader’s attention, "short-and-choppies" are a delight. They're especially useful in breaking up lengthy passages of expository narration.
So! As you go back through your draft before sending it out, make sure you hit each of these points consistently throughout. If you do, then trust me: your manuscript will be head and shoulders above many others that a publisher reads.
Happy editing!