Susie was hungry. She hadn’t eaten since the night before. The pizza looked good sitting on the table in front of her. She took a piece and placed it in her mouth. As she bit into it, she smiled. It was as good as it looked.
Besides the word pizza, there really isn’t anything in this passage that makes us crave a sumptuous, cheesy Italian dish (or want to read anymore about Susie). We need to fix this segment so that it leaves readers with minds full of awe and stomachs empty of pizza.
There are several components we need to edit in order to remedy this. For now we’ll tackle the first—bland adjectives. An adjective is just a word that describes something. In this case, “hungry” and “good” are the adjectives.
So what’s wrong with these? They seem pretty legitimate; we know exactly what the author is talking about. The problem is that they don’t conjure any emotions. They are bland. But we’re trying to write about pizza, you might protest. Why should we care about emotions?
Emotions are vital because they help readers remember what they read. Instead of recalling the typed words on the page, they relive the feelings elicited by those words. Writing that causes people to feel something is powerful. And when writing is powerful, readers like it, remember it, and come back for more.
What’s the hungriest you’ve ever been? Was it after competing in an athletic event? Or working on a tough outside job? What did it feel like?
And how about when you finally sat down to eat? Where were you? What did it taste like? Were the tears pouring down your cheeks? Probably not, but these pictures in your mind—recollections of strong feelings—are the kind we need to inject into our pizza passage so the reader gets a better picture than “Susie was hungry”.
Another important way to make writing more powerful is to choose words that are unique and specific—words that mean something special and aren’t used by just anyone to describe just anything.
So instead of a “good” pizza, picture this one—the one that is about to satisfy Susie’s intense, ravenous, aching hunger. It rests in its box, the soft golden cheese oozing down the sides and soaking into the cardboard. Circling the perimeter, the crispy, crunchy crust keeps the plenteous sausage crumbles from falling out. Pools of oil glisten in the crevices on the surface—crevices that look like the craters on the moon.
When you write, paint a word picture so vivid readers will be dabbing their eyes and clutching their hearts over the beauty of what you have described. This is just the initial step to making your writing pop, but it is an important one and will make a big difference in the quality and power of your writing.
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