For this post, I thought I would do more of a fun topic for people who might want to get started with writing.  Over the last several years, I have picked up a lot of tips and tricks to help make my writing better.  However, what I have not really touched on is what you shouldn’t be doing while you’re writing.  There are a lot of common mistakes beginner writers make that almost automatically peg them as an amateur writer.  Luckily, there are a few easy tricks you can use to make sure you do not sound like a beginner.

My first piece of advice is to avoid using too many adjectives and descriptive words.  This is sometimes difficult to do.  It is very hard to figure out how much description is too much, but what beginner writers tend to do is describe EVERYTHING.  The trick is to only describe what is necessary (e.g. the scenery, a character’s facial features, etc.).  For example, if you’ve already established a character has black hair, you don’t need to mention the black hair in every scene that character is in.  You should also avoid describing too many things that are not essential to the plot. This is something amateur writers often do because they’re afraid of underwriting they’re scenes.  It’s okay if you overwrite your scenes during your first draft, but when you’re going through and editing for the second draft you should be looking out for any unnecessary descriptions that can be taken out.

The second thing I would avoid is info-dumping.  “Info-dumping” is basically an umbrella term for writing too much information at once. This mostly happens in fantasy or high adventure stories that require a lot of world building because the writer has the difficult task of explaining the universe their story takes place in (i.e. if the world has different food, currency, holidays, creatures, traditions, etc.).  However, it’s a common mistake many writers often make and I get so annoyed when I read a book with several info dumps because they’re just difficult to read. If you don’t know how to sprinkle your world building throughout the book, it’s pretty easy to they you’re an amateur writer.

Lastly, it’s very important to look out for word or phrase repetition.  This might seem like an obvious mistake, but even the best of writers make this error.  It can be something as simple as overusing “very” or “really,” but I’ve even come across writers overusing phrases like “to my chagrin” (this is big for Victoria Aveyard books) or “I let out a breath I didn’t even know I was holding” (namely in any Sarah J. Maas book, but I’ve seen it in others).

Although implementing these tips won’t automatically make you a writing pro, they’re easy mistakes you can fix that will make you’re writing so much better.  I admit I’m guilty of making some of these errors, but I’m working on it and I hope some of you find this helpful!