Are you the kind of writer that uses the same kinds of sentences all the time? Do you think that might be just a little bit monotonous? Think of your writing as being a bass drum, beating steadily with no percussion and no other instruments.

Now add some tom-tom drums, a snare drum, cymbals, and a high-hat. Change the beat from slow and steady to something more upbeat; you might just find more people listen and the same applies to your writing.  Read this paragraph aloud:

The thunderstorm was crashing around the house. The rain was pounding on the roof. She went to the kitchen. She answered the telephone. There wasn’t anyone there. Who was it? She was scared. She locked all the doors. Then the lights went off. A loud noise rattled the roof. A strange noise came from outside. Her hands were shaking.

Ok, so you know exactly what is going on, it's all very clear. But be honest now, could you read an entire novel written in that way? Is that the way you write? If it is, then you seriously need to consider shaking things up a little. Begin with an independent clause – that’s a complete sentence that stands on its own. Play about a little, get a new rhythm going in each paragraph, scene, every chapter and, eventually, your entire novel.

Writing is very much like music; it needs a beat, it needs a rhythm and you can learn to write like that just the same as you can learn to play the drums.

Five tips – read them, learn  them, use them.

Two Independent Clauses – Join Them

Independent clauses are simple sentences that contain a subject and a verb that go together. That means they can stand alone. There are a couple of ways to join two of these independent clauses together:

Write the first independent clause and then, instead of a period, add a comma. Then add a conjunctive – and, but, for, so, yet, or, nor, etc., depending on what your sentence meaning is and then add that second independent clause.

Shania was frightened, but she crept to the kitchen anyway. She needed her flashlight so she felt around in the drawers for it.

The second way is to use a semi-colon which works when the independent clauses are related to one another:

The storm sounded like a hurricane; it was really fierce and unexpected.

Commas and semi-colons are useful pieces of punctuation that can do all sorts of wonderful things to a sentence, provided they are used correctly. They can break a sentence up, they can join two sentences together, they can even change the meaning of the sentence if you aren’t careful!

Have a play about with a couple of independent clauses and see how you get on. See how you can shake up your writing and make it more exciting to read; add some tension, a bit of suspense and then we’ll look at the next tip in part 2 of this mini-series.