Strong Verbs

Let’s pretend you’re writing a ToyDust fan-fiction. Because let’s be honest. Who wouldn’t want to write a fan-fic about me? (insert sarcasm)

And let’s further pretend you had written something like:

“ToyDust walked excitedly out of Dallas Vintage Toys, thrilled with his purchase.”

Is there anything wrong with the way this is written?

It’s a grammatically correct sentence, after all. At least according to my computer’s grammar-checker-underlining thing. 

But let’s take a closer look.

When writing your stories it’s good to use verbs that give the reader a clear picture of what is happening. A verb that gives a clear picture of the action is often referred to as a strong verb.

The verb in our example sentence is “walked” and it’s assisted with the adverb “excitedly.”  So, does “walked excitedly” give us a clear picture of me coming out of the store?

I would say no because there are different ways a person could walk excitedly.

So what is a strong verb we could use to replace “walked excitedly” that would give the reader a more specific mental image?

What about “pranced?”

“ToyDust pranced out of Dallas Vintage Toys, thrilled with his purchase.”

To prance means to have a leap in your step and is somewhere between walking and running. This gives us a more precise mental picture than “walked excitedly.” 

And if people have a leap in their step, we can see they are excited. So if we use the verb “prance” there isn’t a need for the adverb “excitedly.”

Okay, now we have a verb that gives us a clear picture of the action, but what else happened as a result of this edit?

“Pranced” is less syllables than “walked excitedly.” So, not only do we have a more specific mental image, but the sentence reads smoother with less syllables to go through.

Remember to choose strong verbs, and have fun writing your stories!

ToyDust out!