Musings about Style

Yesterday a potential client rejected my services because they ‘preferred another style’. As a professional writer I take pride in meeting my clients’ requirements. I write about what they want me to write, and I write it in the style that they want. And I can do this. On my blog you’ll probably see the ‘chatty, informal me’, but there’s a ‘business me’, an ‘academic me’, and many more varieties of me. 

This is just one of the frustrations of trying to make it as a freelance writer. But frustrations aside, I cherish the opportunity to spend my days doing something that I love. I delight in being able to rationalise all the time I spend reading about writing. I call it ‘professional development’.

On the issue of style, one of the most useful and practical books I have found is Joe Glaser’s Understanding Style: Practical Ways to Improve Your Writing. My favourite chapter at the moment is about “Finding Fresh Words”. 

I’ve been writing a large number of descriptions of holiday villas. Keeping them fresh was a challenge. It’s unlikely that someone will sit and read them all and think, “There’s that phrase again” or, “Didn’t I read those words about another villa I looked at”. But for me the task was not only to create interesting and informative descriptions for people planning to rent a villa. I wanted to enjoy writing them. I wanted to learn something from writing them. I wanted to discover how to create an image that had the potential to alter a reader’s way of looking at something familiar. I mean, that’s what I love about writing. 

When I tackle a new topic, I find it useful to start with finding out who will be reading what I’ve written, and what they usually read. I look at how others writing about the same subject write. What vocabulary do they use? I read what’s already been written and determine what I like, and don’t like, what’s effective and what isn’t. 

To tackle the villa descriptions I immersed myself in travel writing – good and bad. I added words and expressions to a list. Some I changed, some I kept the same. Then I found words and images I could use in a place where I hadn’t gone to look for them. I found them in fiction, in the novels that I was reading when I needed a break from writing.

Hope this has been useful. Do you have any tips on changing style, or hints for writing about new topics?