Since I proof, edit, and critique several manuscripts for students, clients, and coaching club members each week, naturally I come across a variety of elements that make a story or article less than it could be.Here are just a few of the most common problems I see, and tips to avoid or correct them:

1) Overuse of participle phrases to begin a sentence. You know what a participle phrase is. It usually begins with a word that ends in the letters “ing.”

Here are some examples:

Tripping over her shoelaces, Mary stumbled onto the sidewalk.

Looking over his shoulder, Jeff called out to Michael, “Be careful!”

There is nothing wrong with beginning a sentence with a participle phrase. But when you do it too often, it begins to draw attention to itself and distract the reader from the action of the story.

When you finish writing a story, go back over it and circle all the sentences that begin with a participle phrase. If you have several of these phrases on each and every page, change most of them. Like this:

Mary tripped over her shoelaces, which sent her stumbling onto the sidewalk.

Jeff looked over his shoulder and called out to Michael, “Be careful!”

2) Dislocating or projecting body parts. Yes, many writers actually do this in their stories and articles. The most common example of this is characters whose eyes leave their bodies. Here’s what I mean:

I was angry at Mark. I shot my eyes across the room at him.

Yikes! Poor Mark. Was he left holding those eyeballs, or were they just stuck on the front of his shirt or something?

3) Dialogue that is punctuated incorrectly. The most common example is when characters laugh words. They simply can’t do this.

Try it yourself. Can you laugh and speak at the same time? Not really. Yet, when you use a comma to separate the dialogue tag from the dialogue itself, you are indicating the words were laughed. Here’s an example:

“You are such a comedian,” Mary laughed.

To avoid this mistake, simply use a period after the dialogue, creating two separate sentences. Like this:

“You are such a comedian.” Mary laughed.

It’s easy to avoid these common mistakes once you’re aware of them.

Happy writing!