Google Image Search
We were all new authors at some point. Not that we weren’t writing before for school or other reasons. It’s just that there was a point where we decided to take the trade seriously and refine our abilities. Of course, this is usually after we’ve developed some terrible habits that nobody would correct in every day life. It is funny how we have to be grammatically correct when writing, but not really when speaking. This is why dialogue can be a nightmare with editing.
I’ve had some doozies in my life. Overusing the word ‘just’ or ‘only’. Not knowing any dialogue tags other than ‘says’, ‘asks’, and ‘exclaims’. Having no idea how to use commas until after college. All of these pale in comparison to the first habit, which is what led to a major aspect of my style.
In high school, I started trying to write detailed stories. The problem was that I couldn’t keep a story’s tense straight if my life depended on it. The meme above is all about me at age 15. I’d start a sentence with past and end it with present. Future would show up randomly in a paragraph. I was all over the map and my writing teacher finally had me stay late after school to have a talk. This is when I was shown the differences between the tenses and told to pick one. I went with present because the images I was explaining on the page were going on in my head in real time. Had no idea present tense stories were so rare. Of course, nobody told me until I published ‘Beginning of a Hero‘.
I still make these mistakes at times, but I’m able to catch it. So, what was the worst habit you had to overcome as an author?
Legends of Windemere 
My worst habit is spelling. When I was in grade school, some idiot decided to drop phonetics and go to memorization. Being poor at memorization, I lost out. I cannot “sound out ” words phonetically to decipher spelling options. It wasn’t until the advent of spell check that I could produce error-free documents.
LikeLiked by 3 people
I think they do both these days. Not really sure because I don’t remember a lot of phonetics.
LikeLiked by 2 people
😁
LikeLike
Hard to say what the worse one is since I still have some of these habits. (Like the word just, though others have told me about this before and I have yet to break the habit.) One bad habit I have, besides the avoidance of writing due to discouragement, is to state an action out of sequence. For example, I’ll write a sentence showing a character’s reaction. In the next sentence, I’ll write the action that caused the reaction. “Susan screeched. The cat sunk her claws into Susan’s leg.” I wish I were kidding.
LikeLiked by 2 people
I overuse ‘just’ a lot. There are some others too. That other issue seems easy to fix. I do it at times and just flip them.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I also wind up flipping them. But I wish I didn’t do this so often. Another habit I have is redundant actions or dialogue. For example:
Joe nodded. “Yes.” 😔
LikeLike
Guilty of that too.
LikeLike
Reblogged this on Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog and commented:
Be sure to share YOUR worst writing habits with, Charles 🙄
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks. 😁
LikeLiked by 2 people
One of my pet hates is mixed tense, lols 😂. My crutch words, which I have to watch out for every time, are ‘just’ and ‘only’. You’d think I’d have learnt by now! Great post, Charles 💕🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Crutch words don’t surprise me. I think it stems from how we speak by using the same words. Most people appear to utilize a limited vocal vocabulary out of habit.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on Kim's Musings.
LikeLike
Thanks for sharing.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I recently read my first novel and was appalled by all the instances of the word “that.” Quite often, it can be omitted. The book could have been several hundred words shorter!
LikeLike
I use it a lot and never knew there was so much hate for it. I’m always fascinated by people saying certain words can just be eliminated. Makes me think about how we’re supposed to write different than how we speak.
LikeLiked by 1 person
That’s one of my problems with advice to writers. Words shouldn’t be outlawed, even ones that are overused. (Notice the 2 “thats” in this short comment. ) 😉
LikeLike
I agree. Funny how we try to create strict rules for writing. Then people complain that everyone has similar styles.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I overuse “that” and have to watch out for it. Took me a long time to reduce the dialog tags, too.
LikeLike
Are dialog tags that bad? I’m noticing a lot of people are reducing the use of things that were once common. It’s like somebody declared them bad and now a reductionist type of writing is the new thing.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I understand this change. I try to mix up with beats and even just let the dialog flow if there are only two present.
LikeLike
I find that I continue giving the same background information at least until 3/4 of the way in. So during revisions, I have to take out all but the first one, and trust my readers to remember what I’ve already told them. Or, if I think they need to be reminded, I find a different way to give that info.
LikeLike
That’s a challenging habit to break. I seem to do it whenever I take a long break from writing. It’s like I’m reminding myself.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on NEW BLOG HERE >> https:/BOOKS.ESLARN-NET.DE.
LikeLike
Thanks.
LikeLike