12
The guy who told me to stop using adverbs in my first draft
I was at a coffee shop in Portland last summer reading aloud a short story to a friend. This older guy at the next table leaned over and said 'you know adverbs are just crutches for weak verbs, right.' He pointed to a line where I wrote 'she ran quickly' and said 'just say she sprinted or she darted, pick one.' I got defensive at first but he had a point. Has anyone else had a random stranger give writing advice that actually made you rethink your whole process?
2 comments
Log in to join the discussion
Log In2 Comments
patricia_hayes4h ago
Honestly that's a solid point he made, even if it stung at the time. Random people can be brutally honest but sometimes they're not wrong. I had a guy at a bus stop tell me my dialogue tags were boring and I was mad for a week, but he was right. It's wild how a stranger can see something you've been missing for months. Good on you for taking it in stride, most people would have just gotten annoyed and ignored it. Tbh that's a pretty generous thing to do for someone you don't know.
8