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Jemi Fraser on Redundancies!


Redundancies – Saying It Twice!

I often wonder if I should nominate myself for the crown of Queen of Redundancies.

When I’m drafting stories, I tend to write fairly quickly. I’m a big fan of NaNo and usually have no serious troubles completely the 50k in one month.

However...

One of the down sides of drafting quickly is I’m thinking ahead, not looking back. I tend to say the same thing more than once. Often right in a row. Obviously I don’t use the same words, but I repeat the information in a new way. Sometimes I imply it or state it several times within the same scene. (I blame one of my history teachers who never gave us high marks unless we could say the same thing at least three different ways. *sigh*)

I’m learning to trust my audience more. (You have no idea how hard it was for me to NOT add another sentence here explaining what that first sentence meant... It’s an addiction!)

Now, when I’m revising, I’ve trained myself to look for places where I can ‘slash and burn.’ This is by far my favourite stage of revising and editing now. It’s become a bit of a game for me to find those redundant phrases. Imagining Aragorn and Legolas standing by my side with their swords ready to slash helps as well.

How about you? Do you have troubles with redundancies? Do you get annoyed when the author keeps repeating the same information?

Jemi Fraser is an aspiring author of contemporary romance. She blogs and tweets while searching for those HEAs.