Lindsey Komson

Featured image by RDNE Stock project

Do you want to become a better writer, but don’t feel like reading all these academic books? Good news – consider this blog post your “Writer’s Toolbox Starter Kit.” Here are three tips to begin building your writers toolbox:

Develop a distinct voice

I know I’ve spoken about this before, but nobody wants to read something with academic language if they’re not reading for school. Take this blog post for example – I might be writing about a book, but what’s gotten you this far is probably my voice and little anecdotes, not necessarily the content. By developing a distinct voice, you not only keep a reader’s attention, but you create a relationship with the reader so they can recognize your writing anywhere.

Understand structure

While the type of structure depends on what you’re writing for, having structure plays a huge part in keeping a reader or audience invested. There are two basic types of structure (I’m sure there are many more) but organizing your piece numerically or with headers creates ease for your reader. Numerical structure helps when you’re telling a story and gives the reader an idea of the order of events. Headers help when breaking up a bunch of information into sections – just like this blog. Chapter 10, “Bits & Pieces,” of William Zinsser’s book, On Writing Well, is organized that way, which is actually where I got the inspiration for this blog post!

Write about what you’re interested in

When you write about topics you’re interested in, most of the time you’ll lose track of time and just keep writing. That’s what happens when I write personal narrative pieces – I can’t seem to stop writing. When you force yourself to write about topics you don’t really care about, it will just create roadblocks, and eventually create a negative association in your brain about writing. By writing about topics you’re interested in, not only will you write more, but you’ll probably create better quality work because you’ll want to represent the topic to the best of your ability (and probably with your distinct voice!)

I might not be an expert on writing, but these are just three tips to sharpen your writer’s toolbox. Now it’s time for you to start collecting some more tools and develop into the writer you’re capable of becoming.

References

King, D. (2005). Writing for (not by) the Ear. https://justread.link/uWGB7Iaih

Zinsser, W. (n.d.). Bits & Pieces. In On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction (pp. 67–91). essay, HarperCollins.