Few sins are worse than pompous, self-important and cluttered thinking and writing.

Stick to just the facts, ma’am. Give us the unvarnished detail. 

Focus on the tense faces or frantic concentration of your characters.

Keep quotes and dialogue to the point. This is not the time for long speeches. Get in, get out.

Read it aloud. Hear how it sounds as well as reads. Feel how it affects your breathing.

If you run out of breath, shorten your sentence or split it into two sentences.

Shorten all sentences. Aim to cut 8% to 10% of your words.

Don’t be afraid to use sentence fragments to convey dramatic effect or a sense of speed.

Those first 14 sentences total 113 words or eight words per sentence.

As you have already figured out, I am a short sentence fan. They do only one job at a time.  

One job. One idea. I trust that you as an intelligent writer will become a short sentence fan, too.

The five sentences above total 36 words or 7.2 words per sentence. That’s really short – but effective.

That sentence originally read: As an intelligent reader, you have already figured out that I am a fan of short sentences. They do only one job at a time.

I trust that you as an intelligent writer will become a short sentence fan, too. 

That does not mean all your sentences should be short. Pace your sentences. 

Revise them until they flow like water in a stream.

Like a horse race, you keep pace with the competition, then turn on the speed in the last furlong. 

Sprint when sprinting is needed

Short and long sentences – just not any longer than they need to convey a single thought. 

Build your next sentence on your last one.

Shortening your sentences may seem like an easy trick, says writing coach Henneke Duistermaat. 

That would be a mistake. Ernest Hemingway wrote long sentences, too. Here’s one of 32 words in The Old Man and the Sea: He looked at the sky and saw the white cumulus built like friendly piles of ice cream and high above were the thin feathers of the cirrus against the high September sky.

Too many short sentences become staccato. 

They kill the rhythm of your writing unless that is your intent. 

Mix short and long sentences. Read your writing aloud to hear how well your words flow. If you have to catch your breath mid-sentence, insert a period and begin a new sentence as Hemingway does here:

You are killing me, fish, the old man thought (9 words). But you have a right to. (6 words) Never have I seen a greater, or more beautiful or a calmer or more noble thing than you, brother. (19 words)

Writing clearly requires thinking clearly.

Run the math test on your sentence lengths. Did you mix long and short sentences? You can revise your sentences to give them a greater pace. A greater power.

Did you think deeply about your message? 

Did you share it in simple language?

Next: Reporting  the stories behind the stories

The above will appear in The Art of Compelling Writing, Volume 3. 
Volume 1 and 2 are available at Amazon.com for $9.99 each. 
The author, a writing coach and retired newspaper owner, wrote these books to help editors like you teach your reporters how to write well. 
Sales proceeds go to adult literacy tutoring. You can change lives by helping us teach reading and writing.
To comment or with questions, please write JerryBellune@yahoo.com. He would like to hear from you.