(Dianne) Fox Writes

I’ve just finished reading The 38 Most Common Fiction Writing Mistakes (And How To Avoid Them) by Jack M. Bickham [Barnes&Noble|Amazon].

While the book didn’t blow me away, the structure was smart — 38 short sections, each on a different issue in writing, easy to refer back to — and there were several excellent points made by the author.

One of my favorites was this, in reference to dialogue:

“…for heaven’s sake put the noun or pronoun first.” (Bickham, 53)

I see this SO MUCH in the books I proofread, and it’s really hard to read. It honestly makes me — just based on that alone — not buy those authors’ books.

“Oh, my!” said Janie. “Whatever are you going to do?”

Arnie shrugged. “I don’t know,” said he.

…just put the noun or pronoun first. Please. Actually, in that second one, just leave off the dialogue tag altogether. “Arnie shrugged.” is enough to tell us who’s talking.

In any case, this was a decent book with some really good points to be made about specific problems in fiction writing, and I enjoyed reading it. It definitely sparked some ideas for me.