Your Story Begins with a Word

Most of the questions I receive personally are about specific details regarding the editing process of a novel or story during or after the writing process. Most of those questions are often very similar in context/content as well, so I’ll provide a general discussion of the word, and how or why words can make or break a story.

I know what you’re thinking: You ain’t gonna have a story without no words.

Bear with me. I know what I’m doing, and when you’r done reading, so, to, will you.

A single word can make or break a story….

What if you read the word lanky? What image comes to mind? What if you read the word thin or wiry? Do different images come to mind?

Let’s look at a single sentence now.

The lanky man walked down the street.

What do you see?

How about: The thin man walked down the street.

Or: The wiry man walked down the street.

Different imagery comes to mind, right?

Generally, my advice to writers of all levels of expertise is to just get the story down, get it all down, get it all out of your mind and onto paper, or a screen, or whatever. Once everything is done then it’s time to edit, and this is where it gets complicated.