I love words. I love the way they rhyme, the way they sound, and the way they feel when they roll off the tongue of a gifted narrator. I love words that sound alike but mean different things, words that describe colors, smells, and sounds.
I love words.
The English language is full of words that mean the same as other words. Even common names are like that. For instance, “Jones” is a surname of Welsh origin that dates back to the Middle Ages. It means “John’s son.” So, Jones is Welsh for Johnson, and the two usages evolved on the same island.
Who knew? Jones seems so dissimilar to Johnson that I (an American) would never have guessed.
In a strange twist of irony, English is also full of words that sound nearly alike and look very similar but mean very different things. Even though many of these words are often used interchangeably in casual conversation, they are NOT alike or similar in meaning.
I always notice when an author confuses near-homophones. That is the technical term for words that sound closely alike, are spelled differently, and have different meanings. When we read widely, we’re more likely to notice the difference between words like accept and except when they are written.
The different meanings of seldom-used sound-alike words can become blurred among people who have little time to read. They don’t see how a word is written, so they speak it the way they hear it. This is how wrong usage becomes part of everyday English.
For this reason, new and beginning writers often don’t realize the ways in which they habitually misuse common words until they begin to see the differences in how they are written.
Let’s look at two of the most commonly confused words: accept and except. People, even those with some higher education, frequently mix these two words up in their casual conversation.
Accept (definition) to take or receive (something offered); receive with approval or favor.
- I accept this award.
- We should accept this proposal.
Except (definition) not including, other than, leave out, exclude.
- We’re old, present company excepted.
- Everyone is welcome, with the exclusion of drunks and other miscreants.
Used together in one sentence, they look like this:
We accept that our employees work every day except Sunday.
The following quote is one I have used before, but it’s a good one, so I’ll just repeat myself here.
Farther vs. Further: (Grammar Tips from a Thirty-Eight-Year-Old with an English Degree | The New Yorker by Reuven Perlman, posted February 25, 2021:
Farther describes literal distance; further describes abstract distance. Let’s look at some examples:
-
I’ve tried the whole “new city” thing, each time moving farther away from my hometown, but I can’t move away from . . . myself (if that makes sense?).
-
How is it possible that I’m further from accomplishing my goals now than I was five years ago? Maybe it’s time to change goals? [1]
Consider these three very different words:
- Ensure
- Insure
- Assure
Ensure: When we use these sound-alike words, we want to ensure (make certain something happens) that we are using them correctly.
Insure: We insure our home and auto. In other words, we arrange for compensation in the event of damage or loss of property or the injury to (or the death of) someone. We arrange for compensation should the family breadwinner die (life insurance). Also, we arrange to pay in advance for medical care we may need in the future (health insurance).
Assure: We assure our listeners that everything is correct. In other words, we explain things in a way that dispels any doubts our listeners may have. If we have to, we reassure them by explaining it twice.
It never hurts to have a wide vocabulary, but we must know the meaning and correct uses of words. For the moment, let’s not worry about grandiose (magnificent, complex, ostentatious, pretentious) words that only inflate our prose. We who write must learn how to use all our words accurately and in a context that says what we mean.
The words listed in the following image are often used interchangeably in common speech, and while it may sound normal when your friend says persecute when she means prosecute, incorrect usage conveys the wrong meaning.
I think it helps if a writer is also a poet. When writing a narrative, we have room for a lot more words, which can lead to inflated prose. But when writing poetry, we must do more with less, so the words we choose must have a visual, sensory impact.
Isn’t that what we hope to achieve with all our work?
I have one manuscript in the final revision stage and am working on shrinking the prose while conveying the story. The real struggle for me is achieving uninflated yet visual prose.
I have a lot of words to choose from, and the Oxford Dictionary of Synonyms and Antonyms to help me out. It’s full to overflowing with lovely, visual, sensory words, and like an addict, I have the urge to use them all.
But I won’t. Today, I will write lean, descriptive prose. If I don’t, my editor will ensure that I pare the fluff down.
Discipline feels good.
Credits and Attributions:
[1] Farther vs. Further: (Grammar Tips from a Thirty-Eight-Year-Old with an English Degree | The New Yorker by Reuven Perlman, posted February 25, 2021 (accessed 18 May 2024).
When your spouse has Parkinson’s, problems tend to arrive en masse, like an unstoppable horde of lemmings. Dealing with life’s lemmings requires a bit more creativity than merely making a cool, relaxing drink. While you may never gain control of the migrating mob, you must somehow steer them in the right direction.
Wikipedia says:
But back to the lemmings. We know how mob mentality works in humans, and it seems to happen in other creatures.
Two weeks ago, my husband fell, sustaining a minor injury. Two days later, he was fighting off an infection, and we spent last Saturday in Urgent Care from 8:00 am to 7:00 pm. Rather than put him in the hospital, we were given the chance to participate in the 
No one is perfect, but I like to do my best work. I’ll admit that publishing a post discussing a picture but with no image of that art piece is a humorous blooper. We did get a laugh out of it.
I try to write my posts on Saturdays and proof them on Sundays, so having only two to deal with will allow me time to proofread them and work on my other creative writing projects.
Artist: Albert Bierstadt (1830–1902)
When I am writing poetry, I look for words that contrast vividly against each other. I choose action words that begin with hard consonants and emotion words that begin with softer sounds.
Verb choices and the use of contrast in descriptors are crucial at this stage.
At the end of his story, events and interactions have changed him despite his wish for a calm life. His journey through the darkness brings about a renaissance, a flowering of the spirit.
If I want to create an atmosphere of anxiety, I would use words that push the action outward:
That action affects both Selwyn and his objective: leaving. Away is an adverb (modifier) denoting distance from a particular person, place, or thing. It modifies the verb, giving Selwyn a direction in which to go.
The trick is to choose the descriptors and the verb forms that have the most impact. The selection of modifiers and connecting verbs can enhance contrasts or weaken a sentence.
One thing I notice when listening to an audiobook is crutch words. One of my favorite authors uses the descriptor “wry” in all its forms, just a shade too frequently. As a result, I have scrubbed it from my own manuscript, except for one instance.
The words authors choose add depth and shape their prose in a recognizable way—their voice. They “paint” a scene showing what the point-of-view character sees or experiences.
What are descriptors? Adverbs and adjectives, known as descriptors, are helper nouns or verbs—words that help describe other words.
However, if you have used “actually” to describe an object, take a second look to see if it is necessary.
The scene I detailed above could be shown in many ways. I took a paragraph’s worth of world-building and pared it down to 19 words, three of which are action words.
We rely on water generated by glaciers on Mount Rainier and the Cascade Mountains in general, so the low snowpack means trouble later down the road.
I grew up in an isolated rural environment, and summers could be lonely. My sister and I would get away from family dynamics by reading. My favorite “We Don’t Have Anything to Read” book was the volume of collected works by William Butler Yeats. That book shaped my view of poetry and literature in general.
Sometimes, poetry is long, even epic in length. The epic poem, 
When prepping a novel to send to Irene, I use a three-part method. This requires specific tools that come with Microsoft Word, my word-processing program. I believe these tools are available for Google Docs and every other word-processing program. Unfortunately, I am only familiar with Microsoft’s products as they are what the companies that I worked for used.
Part two: Once I have ironed out the rough spots noticed by my beta readers, this second stage is put into action. Yes, on the surface the manuscript looks finished, but it has only just begun the journey.
The most frustrating part is the continual stopping, making corrections, and starting.
I am wary of relying on 
If you read as much as I do (and this includes books published by large Traditional publishers), you know that a few mistakes and typos can and will get through despite their careful editing. So, don’t agonize over what you might have missed. If you’re an indie, you can upload a corrected file.
If the meaning is understood when two words are combined into one, and common usage writes it as one word, again a hyphen is unnecessary.
But what about !? These mutant morsels of madness are called “interrobangs.”
One of my favorite authors, Ann McCaffrey, set off telepathic conversations with both italics and colons in the place of quote marks.
If you are writing in the US, you might consider investing in 
Let’s get two newbie mistakes out of the way:
All three of the above sentences are technically correct. The usage you habitually choose is your voice.
Why are these rules so important? Punctuation tames the chaos that our prose can become. Periods, commas, quotation marks–these are the universally acknowledged traffic signals.
So now, we realize that we must submit our work to contests or publications if we ever want to get our name out there. We have looked at our backlog of short stories and gone out to sites like 
The first thing we’re going to look at is the problem. Is the problem worth having a story written around it? If not, is this a “people in a situation” story, such as a short romance or a scene in a counselor’s office? What is the problem and why did the characters get involved in it?
Worldbuilding is crucial in a short story. Is the setting I have chosen the right place for this event to happen? In this case, I say yes, that it is the only place where such a story could happen.
Point of view: First person – Oriana tells us this story as it happens. We are in her head for the entire story. Do her actions and reactions feel organic and natural? After some work, I think yes, but again, I’ll have to run it by someone to be sure.
Life in the Realm of Fantasy 