Number One Rejection Reason - Forced Writing

Outside of those people who simply submit the wrong genres to me (which is unfortunately high), one of the biggest reasons I find myself rejecting authors comes down to their actual writing. It has nothing to do with grammar and punctuation. I reject authors because their writing is forced.

The definition of "forced" from our wonderful online dictionary is: "Produced or maintained with effort; affected or unnatural.

This is a pretty common thing we see with people who are new to writing, or people who really don't understand the concept of writing quality work. What we see in the text is a lot of words that just sit there on the page. We see writing that does not draw the reader in. We see writing that really struggles to get off of the page.

So, how does this happen?

Obviously, the main reason is that an author is still learning the craft. Like anything that we do, those early stages of that craft are very elementary. When we learn to swim, it is awkward and clumsy. Sure, our arms and legs might be moving the way our coaches told us, but it is still a struggle. It just does not look pretty. The odds are, as well, that as you are swimming, you are seriously thinking about every stroke and kick. You are thinking about arm placement as well as when and how to breathe.

It takes time to learn the craft. It takes time to know how to craft that perfect scene or chapter.

We also see this forced writing showing up when authors are using "techniques" because they learned it in a workshop, in a book, or on a blog such as this. Someone said to use the technique because "it works" but we really still do not know how or why it works.

Forced writing also comes across in the way the plots are created or the way the characters act, behave and talk. Dialogue sounds stilted. Scenes seem to be awkward. Solutions for the conflict appear out of the blue and not as a result of the characters.

The impact of this forced writing is that a novel now becomes difficult to read. Words just do not flow off the page. As a reader, we cannot connect with the text. We now feel the book is "just OK."

So, how does an author fix this? The solution is easy and can be summed up in one word.

PRACTICE!

\produced or maintained with effort; affected or unnatural