This is all just fascinating, and I have to say that like CC, I'm also finding it a bit paralyzing.
One thing - about the "is recounting a memory introspection?" I would be on the "no" side of that vote. I think that stories need to have a good balance of narrative as well as action - sometimes in order to maintain the pace of a story, it is simply better to "tell" instead of "show", and I would think that very much implies to memories recounted unless the memory is so impactful it warrants a scene. Just MHO, of course.
I had a writing teacher also give me the "highlighter" editing technique, wherein you use different color highlighters to mark up your manuscript to find problematic passages. For example, a yellow highlighter to mark up all adverbs (don't want too many there), a pink highlighter for all said-bookisms, etc. This is both a good thing and a bad thing for me - good in that a lot of times I think I've overused something come to find out I haven't, but also bad because I get somewhat paranoid as I write.
Which brings me to three questions/issues that this same writing teacher passed along as big no-nos in writing that I seem to have problems with.
One is the overuse of adverbs. Somehow I just can't let go of the "-ly is my friend" philosophy. Now, while I'm quite proficient in changing things like "walked slowly" into "strolled" and "smiled cheerfully" into "grinned", I just can't manage to give up these little crutches. I haven't figured out how to condense "kissed passionately" or "gripped painfully". Is there a list of these somewhere <g>?
The other bit of advice that I've been trying to employ is to wean myself of the dreaded "It was". This teacher's hard and fast rule (which I know all rules are meant to be broken, bent, and battered to within an inch of their lives) was to NEVER start a sentence with "It was." It is far too passive of a sentence structure and is a definite example of telling, not showing. She swore up and down that there is always another way to write the sentence without using it. Sometimes, I just can't find that way.
And finally, the dreaded "that". I think I must use if far more than I'm supposed to because according to my Teacher (note the capital T), the word "that" should be ruthlessly searched-and-deleted throughout the story.
So any thoughts on these three big taboos? I know, I know, everything in moderation. Although when it comes to "said" I have to actively force myself to go through my story and replace said-bookisms with "said". I love whispereds and groaneds and retorteds. I guess I must just be a really lazy writer.
Lynn
