Common Writing Pitfalls

When asked, a group of editors from top publishing houses, responded that the following are the most often seen mechanical errors in works submitted by authors. By removing these errors from our works, we greatly enhance our potential for publication—and strengthen our writing skills.
       
Author Intrusion, Filtering, Passive Voice.
Use the active voice in writing. Avoid weak verbs: "to be" and its variants: was, are, is. This puts the reader on-scene, makes what’s happening, happen now. Author intrusion reminds the reader she’s reading, hence you lose immediacy, empathy between reader/character.
       
Show, don’t tell applies.
Watchwords: thought, wondered, considered, realized, and the like.
Example: Filtered: She realized she’d breached the point of no return.
She had to kill him.
       
Unfiltered, no intrusion: The point of no return. She had to kill him.
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