Omit Those Needless Words: How to Do Ruthless Editing 101

Ten tips to make your writing efficient, yet engaging.

- RYAN G. VAN CLEAVE

Regardless of what you write, readers have the same expectation-they insist on stories with language that demonstrates economy, effectiveness, and energy. While entire how-to books could be written about each of those goals, this article focuses on the 10 most impactful story-improving editing tips I've shared with students and clients.

With that, let's examine my 10 best editing tips. Apply these as needed to your own writing, regardless of literary medium or genre.

1: DIVIDE AND CONQUER

Many writers find editing to be daunting. It's understandable there are so many ways for words, phrases, sentences, and paragraphs to go wrong. But don't despair. Harold Underdown, Executive Editor at Kane Press, offers this wise advice: "When looking for words to cut, don't just do one pass through your manuscript. Plan multiple passes, each for a different category-adverbs, empty words, words you use too often. In each pass, don't edit, just identify highlighting is good. Then work through the manuscript one last time, considering and deleting or replacing all of the words you highlighted."

In short, revise in stages to avoid being overwhelmed.

2: REMOVE REDUNDANCY

The first draft of a story is where authors discover the story for themselves they're the only audience at that point. Given that, it's easy to see why overwriting is commonplace in early drafts. When it's time to edit, though, redundancy in meaning should be addressed.

The gas line explosion at the Oakview Senior Center was a horrible tragedy.

Building the birdfeeder so close to the house was an unintentional mistake.