Plot and story: Plot is what happens. Story is how plot causes a character to change. Effective writing needs both. Back to School Assignment Every September of my school life, the first writing assignment was some variation of What I did over summer vacation. In retrospect I pity my teachers who were forced to wade through boring itineraries. I took swimming lessons. My sister and I played in the sprinklers with the neighbor kids. Our family vacation was driving to Aunt Wally’s and Uncle Pete’s. We swam in their pool with my cousins. It was fun. Bo-oring. That was merely a disjointed listing of events. If my summer vacation…
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Avoid Passive Voice
If you want your reader to feel emotion and action on the page, avoid writing in passive voice. It creates distance between the characters on the page and your reader, it dilutes the immediacy, and waters down action. The most common culprit is helping verbs. Passive Voice and Helping Verbs Ban helping verbs from your writing to eliminate passive voice. That may be a little harsh, but in all honesty helping verbs are the most common indicator that you have slipped into passive voice. When active verbs like take, sing, or walk are aided by a version of the verbs ‘to be’ or ‘to have,’ (also known as helping verbs)…
