: Re: Common mistakes made by first time fantasy novelists? I'm in a writing group. I see repeating word-choice patterns among the fantasy writers. Example: frequent use of certain words (like 'utter,'

@Vandalay250

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Advice about adverbs is complex. I will try to explain simply.

Adverbs make writing more vibrant and interesting – sometimes. The 'sometimes' comes from the type of adverb.

There are different types of adverbs. The basic categories are those that modify:

verbs e.g. He ran slowly.
adjectives e.g. She was very small.
other adverbs e.g. He ran extremely slowly.
whole sentences/clauses e.g. Yesterday, we ate pizza.

It is the first type, those that change verbs, which we need to think about more. Consider these pairs of sentences:

She spoke quietly.
She whispered.

He talked loudly.
He shouted.

The man walked slowly along the path.
The man shuffled along the path.

I hope that you will agree that for most purposes the second one is better. Of course, no writing rule is ever absolute, but replacing ‘ly’ adverbs with strong verbs is a good idea.

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