Exercises for Fiction Writers - Page 2. Making Your Writing Exciting At the Sentence Level. Some writers are just a blast to read, from paragraph to paragraph. It almost seems like magic. Your eyes just can’t stop hopping along from one page to the next. How do they do it?
Let me wager a guess: sentences. A lot of beginning writers — caught up in plot and dialogue and characterization and description — sometimes lose sight of craft at the sentence level. Sentence Beginnings Beware of structuring most of your sentences in the same way. Take a look at these two short example paragraphs: I looked down the street, first left, then right. Or: He grabs the book and scans the lettering etched into the leather cover: The Volume of Secrets. If the above paragraphs inspire a vague sense of boredom, it’s because almost every sentence starts the same: “I verb” or “Subject verb.”
Sentence Length Sentence length is another thing you want to take into consideration when you write. The river drifted slowly through the countryside. Now compare to this one: Short, choppy sentences heighten tension. Your Writing Is BORING! | Ghostwriter Dad.