What one tip changed your writing forever?

The 10% rule
I got this from Stephen King, in his book On Writing.

It is simple. After you write something, put it away for a while. If you wrote an entire novel, put it away for a few days or weeks. If it is a short text, several hours will do.

Then, cut down the size by at least 10%.

You can do this by removing unnecessary words, such as needless adverbs or parentheses.

An example from the book (pp.340, draft for ‘1408’):

Mike sat down in one of the chairs in front of the desk. He expected Ostermeyer to sit behind the desk, where he could draw authority from it, but Ostermeyer surprised him. He sat in the other chair on what he probably thought of as the employees’ side of the desk.

Trimmed down to:

Mike sat down in front of the desk. He expected Olin to sit behind the desk, but Olin surprised him. He took the chair beside Mike.

Granted, this is an extreme case, where King brings down the word count from 51 to 26 (51%).

Still, it is a good practice. In general, your text will be easier to read and you will be more successful in getting your message across.

Make sure you remove most dialogue tags and words such as ‘that’, ‘I think’ and words ending with ‘-ing’. As per these excellent answers by Christopher Kingery and Belle Elida.

But do not overdo it!

King also gives an example where he actually expands on the original draft:

‘Hello, ex-wife,’ Tom said to Doris as she entered the room.

Becomes:

‘Hi, Doris,’ Tom said. His voice sounded natural enough - to his own ears, at least - but the fingers of his right hand crept to the place where his wedding ring had been until six months ago.

It goes without saying that the first draft is about as subtle as a Flat Earther aboard the ISS.

The second draft is longer, but it’s not all about reading speed here.

Finally, King has a tip that will make you a guaranteed bestselling author. The trick is to…

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