Keep It Simple

Keeping it simple is the key to good non-fiction writing—both articles and non-fiction books. Let me give you an example.   The pices biota exhibited a hundred percent mortality response.  Whoa! That’s not simple. Why? The words aren’t  simple and they scramble the real meaning of the sentence.. What a terrible piece of writing. Okay, if not that, then what?  How about The Fish Died?  That gives me immediate recognition and a visual image in my reader’s mind.

Let’s look at a few other over-written sentences.

If there is more than one catch basin being used per operation, the catch basins should be monitored relative to the amount of foreign material in them, and a large screen should be placed over each opening in relationship to the size of the materials within each basin. If materials continue to contaminate the down flow afterwards, it is due to the determination of screening quality.

The writer of that paragraph (sentence) got carried away and failed  to state the things between the technical items, clearly. Let’s clear this up.

If you have more than one catch basin and foreign material keeps getting in, then you should place a screen over each opening. The screen should keep out any of the material that might fall in the basin. If material still falls in the basin after you’re installed the screens, then you’d better look closely to make sure the screens themselves are in good shape. 

The words monitored, relative  and relationship are absolutely unnecessary and are thrown in to make the writer look smart. This makes the writing hard to understand.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       “Because I have a lot of other things to do and they take a lot of    time, I don’t think I’ll be able to go on the trip.” 

You can simplify this by taking out unneeded words

I don’t think I can go on the trip because I have a lot of time consuming things to do.

Your suggestions will indeed be discussed during the next Publications Committee meeting.  

That one struggles, let’s make it read in a straight line.

We will discuss your suggestions at the next Publications Committee meeting.

Meaningless openings.

Stop wasting time with meaningless introductory clauses. Don’t ease into your topic with generalizations, hit it head on.

I’ve told you often enough that you have to do things right the first time.

What good are the words, I’ve told you often enough just hit it.

You have to do things right the first time or even Do things right the first time.

Here’s another.

Everybody knows Ms. Hamilton isn’t married.

This is called throat clearing, editors hate it. If you send it in that way they will have to clean it up before they publish it. Again, just hit it.

Ms. Hamilton isn’t married

Use Active Voice

Your verbs have more the impact on your writing than almost anything else.

Here’s a sentence I found the other day.

When you talk to some you ordinarily use good, active verbs that make the conversation come alive. But when people put their thoughts on paper, they suddenly switch to passive verbs that make the writing seem indirect and unemotional. .

Due to the indiscretion of one of our employees it was found necessary by top management to terminate his employment.

Let’s try activating this sentence. 

The boss found Bob taking money from the safe so he fired him.”

That’s one way, let’s try another.

The boss fired one of the employees because he caught her e-mailing all her friends on the company computer.

You can feel which way is more exciting. This may sound hard but it isn’t. The real culprits are the words: are, be, is, was, were, has, been and so forth.

Don’t hedge

One of the problems I keep running into. Most adverbs are hedge words.  This includes such words as “very,” “rather,” “ somewhat, ” really.”  My suggestion is to leave out all the adverbs unless they change the meaning of the sentence.