I’ve heard it said
that you should vary your sentence structures. When I first heard that advice,
I thought, “Oh I do that.”
Not so much.
Word has a handy
feature that lets you change the color of your words. If you want to see how
varied your sentence structure is color all of one particular structured
sentence blue and another red and another green.
Once it’s done,
it’s a fast way to determine if your story is balanced. For example, if you see
three pages of solid blue, maybe change it up.
Changing the color
of the sentences can also be very helpful to see other patterns in your
writing. Try highlighting all of the dialog one color, all of the descriptions
another color, and all of the action another color. Change the color of every
sentence that starts with she or every sentence with an m-dash or that trails
off.
By using colors,
you can visualize areas of weakness (and strength) in your writing.
Happy writing!
Nice tip. I think I tend to be quite long-winded in my sentences sometimes, now I think about it. This might help, thanks!
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