Are you happy with that? Then it's time to take things up a notch.

Combine Independent and Dependent Clauses in One Sentence.

Dependent clauses, otherwise called subordinate clauses, cannot stand on their own, despite having a subject and verb that work together. Why? Because they start with a dependent marker which, if it were conjunctive, would make it independent.

Dependent markers are words like although, after, because, as, as if, even though, even if, since, until unless, whenever, whatever, when, whether, which, in order to, and so on.

Unlike adding two independent clauses together, you don’t need a comma to join a dependent and independent clause. In fact, using a comma takes the flow out of the sentence, not to mention the meaning, because both clauses will be connected closely.

She couldn’t see very well because it was very dark.

She was searching the drawer when a loud crash came from the dining room.

Introductory Clauses are Great

Introductory clauses are dependent clauses but they add so much more to a sentence. They provide background and additional information, helping a reader make sense of what follows. Introductory clauses can be used with pretty much any kind of sentence:

Although her whole body was frozen with fear, she stayed quiet so she could listen.

Because it was so dark, she couldn’t see anything, but she could hear something outside.

Use the Em-Dash

The em-dash is a fantastic way of jazzing a sentence up, of communicating excitement, surprise, fear or a sudden change. Before I show you how, it is important that you do not mix these up with hyphens and en-dashes!

Hyphen – A tiny little line that we use to join words together, usually a string of compound objectives, like “four-year-old-boy.”

En-Dash – Another line that is the same length as the letter “n.” This is usually used by copyeditors who follow the style guides like they are the latest fashion. It is often used as a way of expressing time, i.e. May-September.

Em-Dash – The em-dash is the same length as the letter “m” and looks like an overlarge hyphen. What it isn’t is two hyphens joined together although your word processing app may change a pair of hyphens into an em-dash. Most British and American writers use it for the same purpose – to elicit tension, fear, surprise, and so on:

Shania gasped — the lights flashed on.

She peered around the corner cautiously — there was nothing there.

She thought she saw something —a flash of white — at the other end of the room.

Just a quick note here. When you use a pair of em-dashes in one sentence as a way of highlighting extra information, do make sure that the first and last parts of that sentence make an independent clause. For example, “She thought she saw something at the other end of the room” is an independent cause – the subject is “She” and the verb is “saw”. The part of the sentence between the em-dashes can be anything and doesn’t need to fit in with the rest of the sentence.