There are as many approaches to writing as writers. Reading "How to Write Fiction" books, articles, and guides stopped me from writing for years!

I simply write. The story is in my head, and I use stream-of-conscious. This is why it takes months to complete rewrites.

Discovering how "weak" my prose poured forth was a revelation, but thanks to modern technology, the "finding" is easy and the correcting creates a more well-crafted final product.

Example: THAT.

I'm correcting poor writing in SPACE FLEET SAGAS, my collection of related short stories, before sending it to editing. I give myself April for this one process. Under EDIT I click on FIND, and type in 'that.' 175 times in a work just over 220 pages!

Sometimes, especially in character dialogue, 'that' is fine. Sometimes it should be 'which.'

Every time I follow a term with a descriptive phrase beginning with 'that,' I rewrite, placing the descriptive before the term. 'That' is often an indicator of laziness -- here is an opportunity to build a better description for the reader.

Half the time I will delete 'that.' It is just a word in my head, and can be eliminated, allowing the prose to flow.

Do you know the words you abuse?

Over the next few blogs I will share my "nasty" language, and fixes. Perhaps we share a few.