Learn the Difference of Active vs Passive Voice
Examine your prose to see if you’re using active voice in your sentences. If you didn’t like grammar in school, then at least learn to identify and use active voice in your writing. It will make your prose more accessible and exciting, more gripping to your readers.
What is active voice?
Okay, here you must get a little grammatical. Don’t let it freak you out. It’s really pretty simple. In the active voice, the SUBJECT of the sentence DOES something.
The SUBJECT is the noun, and the DOES is the verb.
If you keep the subject-noun in front of the verb, you’re in an active voice. If you put the noun after the verb, you’re in a passive voice.
Active example: John pounded the table. The SUBJECT (John) pounded (VERB) the table. That’s an active voice.
Passive example: The table was pounded by John.
See how the VERB is now in front of John? (Not to get too technical, but the passive sentence makes the table the actual subject of the sentence, but this will mess with your mind.)
As a general guideline, ask yourself who is the most important person in the sentence? Or what is the most important thing and put that person or thing at the front of the sentence, with the verb after it?
Passive example: The door was plowed into by the car (passive).
Passive example: The gun was held by Steve (passive).
Active example: The car plowed into the door (active).
Active example: Steve held the gun (active).
Related to active voice is the use of strong, vivid verbs. In the last example, a better sentence would be: Steve gripped the gun. Or get creative with something like: Steve white-knuckled the gun.
If you prop up a verb with an adverb, it usually means you need a stronger verb. Jane hit Sam roughly. (hit is generic) Jane slapped Sam. (Better. Vivid, and no adverb necessary).