9 Common Writing Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them

• Laugh track
Another way to tighten your writing is to leave out the laugh track. A laugh track is present when you also give readers hints about how they should react. 

• Countersinking
One way for an author to slow a story is to employ “countersinking.” Countersinking involves making explicit the very actions that the story implies. An example is: “We need to hide,” she said, asking him to seek cover.

• Summary over scene
All too often when novice fiction writers put together a story, an editor will mark whole paragraphs or sections as “Show don’t tell!” or say it was underwritten. In such cases, the writer likely has penned a summary rather than a scene.

• Rear-view mirror descriptions
When writing action scenes, avoiding rear-view mirror descriptions typically is a good idea. In such a description, an object is described only after it’s been part of the action. 

• Verb tense shifts
A common mistake among novice writers is shifting within their story so that events occurred in the now but then in the next paragraph happen in the past. This is a sign that the writer is changing verb tenses.

• Mime conversations
Dialogue in fiction ought to be tight and punchy, but sometimes when penning or editing it, writers go overboard. The result is a choppy flow to the narration as well as text that is robbed of its emotive powers.

• Perception fallacy
When writing from a character’s point of view, authors should avoid the perception fallacy. This clunky kind of storytelling assumes that if a tale is being told from a specific character’s point of view, then all description must be filtered directly through that character’s senses and perceptions.

• Passive voice
So you’ve written a scene packed with action, ripe with conflict, and filled with tension – but every time you read it, the writing feels flat. The problem may be that you’re writing in passive rather than active voice.

• Answering-the-phone cliché
One common way writers slow stories is with the answering-the-phone cliché. This cliché consists of detailing all the trivial steps and dialogue that goes into answering a phone call.