I recently bought a 1990 Toyota Camry. Now, I'm sort of a car-oriented woman, and I pride myself in being able to identify the make and model of most cars I see on the road. Even so, I have to admit I didn't recognize the Camry when I first saw it. It was a fairly generic looking car.

Now that I'm the proud owner of a Camry, I notice them everywhere. Apparently, the Camry holds up pretty well, because just about every fourth or fifth car on the road happens to be one of the exact size and shape as mine, a 10 year old hunk of semi-rusted metal, gears and rubber. Many of them are the same burgundy color. I had to memorize my license plate number just to make sure I didn't hop into the wrong chariot in the K-Mart parking lot.

What does this have to do with writing, you say? Well, here's the connection I promised. Sometimes, we fail to notice things until they become familiar to us. I didn't notice Toyota Camrys, and now I can see that they practically own the road. The same holds true for some of the inherent flaws in our writing. We don't notice them until we're familiar with the concepts and we know them inside and out, like a beloved old car. So, welcome to the Used Writing Glitch Lot. I'm going to sell you a few concepts. Once you own them, you'll recognize them anywhere.

Wimpy Verbs

Wimpy verbs suck the energy from your writing. You can't always cut them, but you can usually find ways to change them and make them stronger. Weakness lurks in "to be" verbs like was, were, are, and is. Vague words used to describe emotions and thoughts are also weak, so be on the look out for words like felt, feel, thought, and think. Most other verbs that don't convey a very specific thought, emotion or action are weak, so use went, looked, and seemed sparingly.

It often helps to think of weak verbs as those that have trouble standing on their own in a sentence. Take a sentence like, "The dog was barking." Remove the modifier ("barking") and you have "The dog was." Not much of a sentence, is it? How about, "The dog barked?" Better! Another good example is: "Give your writing energy." The verb is "give". Remove the modifier ("energy") and you have, "Give your writing." That sounds incomplete, doesn't it? Try, "Energize your writing."

Here are some examples of sentences with weak verbs:

I felt tired.

The boy looked angry.

She seemed content.

I was walking down the street.

Blah! You can rewrite them with more specific actions, being careful to SHOW, not TELL. (All the above examples are "telling".) Here are some possible rewrites:

I yawned and stretched my heavy arms toward the sky.

The boy stamped his foot and shook his fists.

Her lips curled in a slight smile and she hummed to herself.

I strolled down the street.

These are basic rewrites. Your rewrites will depend on the context of your story. You won’t always be able to avoid wimpy verbs. Rewriting them all would make your prose seem pretentious and wordy. Still, it's best to be alert for opportunities to rewrite, always remembering to use concrete, specific verbs.

I've Got a Preposition for Ya

Don't get tangled in strings of prepositional phrases. They make your writing confusing and less readable. You can spot a preposition easily, they're all those ins, outs, ofs and overs. In the house...over the hill...out of the box. Sometimes they're just not necessary.

Instead of, "Her locks of blond hair..." write "Her blond locks." Not "His eyes of green..." but "His green eyes." "The caravan came over the top of the hill?" Nah. "The caravan crested the hill." Get the idea?

Pretty Adverbs Are Exquisitely Boring

Adverbs--those infamous -ly words--aren't always evil. Sometimes they can be used to great affect. Just use them sparingly. Better to use strong verbs in the first place than try to pump up the wimpy ones.

What looks better to you?

The cat ran swiftly OR The cat darted

The boy cried mournfully OR The boy wailed

She ate rapidly OR She gulped her food

I spoke loudly OR I yelled

Avoid Clichés Like the Plague

It's so tempting to use clichés because they're familiar and easy. In fact, clichés became clichés only because they conveyed their sentiments so precisely that they fell into popular use. Avoid the temptation to use clichés, no matter how apropos they seem. Better to do the unexpected and invent something new. Clichés stand out like a sore thumb in your writing. Using them can be the kiss of death. See what I mean?

Redundancy, Redundancy, Redundancy...

There are many different types of redundancies, and they all mean basically the same thing--which is a little ironic, isn't it? Probably the most common problem for fiction writers is repeating information we have already given our readers while slightly changing the wording. To use one of those dreaded clichés, it's like beating a dead horse. Give your reader the benefit of the doubt and assume a certain level of intelligence. Is it really necessary to keep repeating yourself to make sure your readers "get" what you're trying to convey? If that's the case, maybe you weren't specific enough in the first place.

Similes Overrun Your Story Like Ants at a Picnic

Similes and metaphors can be wonderful creative tools, particularly when they enhance the theme or "feel" of your story. After a while, though, they start to crowd your writing, and they tend to look amateurish.

First, let's make sure you know the difference between simile and metaphor. A simile compares two unlike things (similes overrun your story like ants), while a metaphor takes the risk of claiming that one thing IS something else (similes are ants, overrunning your story.) It's easy for similes to fall into cliché: The sun was like a red rubber ball, darkness fell like a blanket, her eyes were like deep pools. Metaphor is more direct and less likely to be misused, although clumsy or inappropriate metaphors can destroy a story just as easily as a clichéd simile.

Try these little tricks to catch those soggy similes and mangled metaphors. First, ask yourself if the simile or metaphor is relevant to the theme of your story. If you're writing a suspense thriller, make sure you're not using light, humorous similes that don't match your tone. And don't mix your similes and metaphors. If you're saying that your villain tracks his victims with the dogged determination of a bloodhound (a cliché, incidentally), don't use the next paragraph to say that he hunts with the stealth of a jungle cat. Also, ask yourself if you've ever heard or read the simile or metaphor used before. Serial killers who track like bloodhounds or hunt like jungle cats aren't particularly original. Find something fresh.

Okay, you've browsed the Used Writing Glitch lot. Let's say you've taken home all these little clunkers and made them your own. You know all their quirks. You should be able to identify them as they show up in your early drafts. It's like I said--once you own them, they start popping up everywhere.

About the Author: Karen Hertzberg discovered that writing on a computer could be done without White-Out, and she was hooked. She knew she was in too deep when she started referring to her children as her "peripherals." She got online about 5 years ago, and feels as though she hasn't been out of arm's reach of her keyboard since.

You may contact Karen at novelshop@ameritech.net