writing

Having Fun in Your Life? Bring it Out in Your Writing!

Just a few days ago, I was watching a standup comedy show and I couldn’t stop laughing for a long time. It made me wonder what was so exceptionally funny with the show. While the standup comedian was mostly cracking one-liner jokes, his strength laid in the real life comic stories that he narrated and enacted. He narrated many funny stories about his family, friends, people on the street, and even his neighbor’s dog! If real life stories sound funny in comedy shows, they sound even funnier when written, especially if they’re written with a sense of humor.

Write Like You Have Never Written Before…

One of the most important aspects of writing is in the background research. No matter how well you know a subject there is always room for more knowledge. There are always going to be opinionated differences on the subject you are writing about, so acknowledge the opinion of others as well. After research has been done, it is essential for the writer to make a structure of what he or she wants to write. This helps you write with linear thought and allows you to experiment writing whenever you want. When you sit down to write, write what you know as this will give you confidence and your writing will become interesting (hopefully anyway).

Select your subject carefully

Choosing the right subject to write about is very important. We also have to know where to limit ourselves when we are writing about something we are passionate about. We cannot become carried away when writing for a topic that captures our interest. At the same time, do not tread into territories that you are unsure of, because this will be reflected in your writing even if you want to hide it in a mesh of a glorious profusion of words.

Analyse your writing

Be very critical of what you write. The more critical you are, the better you will be. If you are your worst critique, you will end up writing your best.

Original is always good

Being original is also very important. You might have a preference of your favourite writer, but you should not let that get reflect in your writing. One of the easiest ways of being original is cropping up new ideas and not writing about something that your favorite writer has already written about. Let your ideas speak volumes and provide evidence for your point of view; don’t allow yourself to fall in love with specific words, as this will lead to you over using them. Read what you’ve written, leaving out parts you question. If the piece still makes sense, leave out the excess.

Be funny and readers will like it

Use a bit of humor in your writing, but be careful of not making it a comic strip (unless you are writing one). Let your humor be kind and tasteful, as a light tone from time to time lowers a reader’s guard and opens them upto your ideas. Choose a title which can attract the attention of your readers. Depending on your topic, you may want to steer clear of a “cute” or “witty” title in favor of one that makes a clear promise of what is inside. Like the beginning, you must “end with a bang” because a strong ending leaves a reader with a lasting impression. A weak ending often ruins the hard labour that you have put behind the entire writing, so make sure your ending has i-m-p-a-c-t.

Don’t forget about those errors

Be very careful of grammatical errors, typos, punctuation and spelling mistakes and edit your writing to its best. Allowing no stone to be unturned when you make the final edit. Remember that “no one notices when a job is done well, but they see your mistakes clearly.” Keep this in mind and adhere to it and you will “write like you have never written before.”

Experience Makes You Perfect

Experience is a bad teacher; it takes your test first and teaches you the lesson later. Rightly said, isn’t it? Who said people are born great writers? Just like other things that you do, getting better at writing requires regular practice. After all, practice makes you perfect and experience certainly counts! By practice, I do not mean reading some writing tips, listening to lectures on writing, or attending readings. I mean actual writing, daily, on meaningful topics or maybe writing about something that interests you.

Generating Interesting Articles and Titles – Part Two

Delving into parts we should not have to reach….colon cleansing made “interesting”

My previous post provided some generic formulae widely used for generating articles and titles that readers are attracted to. As a professional writer, you are not always in a position to pick and choose your assignments and you may be faced with producing content on the most unsavoury of topics. In this instance, I recently had to deal with an assignment on colon cleansing, and though the memory still haunts me, the writing show must nevertheless go on.

Previously, I dealt with “How to..” Lists and quoted a “Study” as a way of generating titles and articles. I will finish this off here, with three more general formula techniques.

Copyright – A Must For Internet Safety

It is a common trend, today, that online content is often found to be republished on other websites without permission being asked from, or credit given to, the original author of the writing. As more professionals make their work available online, protecting it is of primary importance. It is imperative that writers and publishers take steps in protecting their work from people who use it for personal gain. Copyrighting all their online material, gives writers and producers the safety that is needed to protect their work.

Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S. Code) to the authors of “original works of authorship” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, architectural and certain other intellectual works.

Mistakes That Ruin Your Writing Credibility

picture of an erazer

The following are the most common mistakes that people make when writing for fiction, a manuscript or looking to promote a book title.

Poor grammar, spelling, typos and usage

One of the basic aspects of writing is being grammatically correct, without making silly spelling mistakes. The single most common error that people make is the usage of the passive voice. In passive voice, nothing is ever anyone’s fault, because people do not do things. Things happen to people. “Bobby ate the pizza” is active. “The pizza was eaten” is passive. Note that the action of food and the food is more important than the character in the passive voice. When writers are unsure of themselves they often drop into the passive voice. Along with this, people often make mistakes in the usage of tenses. Immature writers will begin stories in whatever tense they want, and not maintain logic in their use of tenses.