Consider This - Adverbs

The first Blog Post - they are supposed to be special and insightful, I'll probably disappoint.

Why "Consider This"? I'm glad you asked. In Year 6 I had an awful teacher who disempowered her students by having them as her pet for one week and then spent the rest of the year picking on them (big bully!). I was unfortunate enough to be her pet in Week 1 of the school year because my parents sent me to school on a Teacher's Strike Day.

If only there had been FaceBook or Blogger or Twitter back then. But there wasn't. Only my wardrobe door. And so, I would write my own little "blog" (not that we knew they would be called that, eventually) and blutac it to my wardrobe door. The only people who read it were me and my best friend, Janelle, who loved to see what I had written up there each week. (Maybe my Mum read it, if she ever ventured into my pigsty of a room.)

Anyway, it was my way of getting my frustration out and venting about what was going on at school.

But, this Blog will not be about Venting, just sharing stuff I've learnt as a writer and author.

So, Day 1 thing I've learnt - Stephen King has a great book called "On Writing" and it's on writing (funnily enough). A great friend, Bruce, lent the book to me and I've always kept with me one very important tip:
- Adverbs are lazy writing. Yep! That all important "adjective to the verb" is lazy writing. If you can avoid using them, do, at all costs. Don't say "She crept slowly." Can someone creep any other way? What about building a picture ("Show, don't tell") like "She crept like a crouched tiger, sneaking up on its prey." Ooh, nice picture (maybe not, but you get the idea).