The synopsis is not a tool for you; it’s a tool for an agent or an editor, for someone you hope will like your story idea enough to want to read the whole manuscript and will want to BUY it.

Editors, and I’m speaking from my own experience, clean up errors and make a lot of suggestions. If I see a hole in the plot, I state where I see it and make suggestions on how to fix it.

Use modifiers that are strong. “Pretty” is not a strong adjective. It doesn’t convey much, and if your purpose is to add detail and visuals to your story, you have done yourself a disservice in using it. Same goes for words like “little,” “very,” and even “good” and “bad”; they are too general and do nothing to add to your story.

We all know that words and how we manipulate them are the backbone to writing a good story, but what helps the reader to understand everything we write is the punctuation we use with those words.

Some of these will sound SO obvious, but having been an editor for the last seven years, I can tell you…writers (including myself) often miss the most obvious of mistakes while rereading and revising their work.

Overall, active voice is preferred over passive voice because active voice shows immediacy, action. However, this isn’t to say you should never use passive voice.

Yes, dialogue, characters, plot, conflict, etc. are important components, but without the WORDS to develop these things, you just have a really good idea.

There are a lot of important tools needed to develop a good story. One of the most important tools you need as a writer is DIALOGUE. With great dialogue, a story can have depth; with weak dialogue, a story can fall flat.

Some people have made a distinction between third-person omniscient and third-person universal omniscient. In universal omniscient, not only does the narrator know everything about all characters, but also he/she knows what the characters DON’T know.

HAPPY NEW YEAR, PEOPLE! I hope you’ve brought your Veni, Vidi, Vici (I came, I saw, I conquered) to the table because in the ’09, I want all writers – new and old – to bring their best game and goals to the writing table. Let’s get it done!