When first starting to put pen to paper, there are some common mistakes that writers often make.

Whether you’ve encountered these tips before or they’re entirely new, they’re worth revisiting. By avoiding these pitfalls, you can significantly transform your writing. Here are some common mistakes to watch out for when writing your novel.

Poorly Managed Transitions

Transitions are crucial to the flow and pace of your story and can be something which beginner writers struggle with. You’ll want to ensure that shifts in time, location or perspective are as smooth as you can possibly make them. For example, it might seem obvious, but you don’t have to describe your character’s every movement. If you need to move your character from one place to another, simply use a scene break and start the next section with them already in the new setting (orienting the reader with some brief description or statement). Summarising can be a useful tool when handling time, and with perspective ensure that you’re not having too many abrupt changes, i.e. head-hopping.

Overusing Adverbs

Try, where you can, to use strong verbs instead of relying too heavily on adverbs. This is not to say you can’t use any, but too many can clutter up the narrative and your writing. Look through your work-in-progress and pick out some sentences with adverbs: can you rewrite them without the adverb while preserving the meaning? Often, the sentence will be all the stronger for it.

Clichés, Mixed Metaphors and Clunky Similes

Avoid comparisons that feel tired or overused, like comparing the sun to an egg yolk. If you can’t think of a fresh comparison, it’s probably better to leave it out. Similes and metaphors should add to the narrative, not detract from it – when done well they can be very illuminating but you don’t want something that’s going to pull your reader out of the narrative. Good writing shouldn’t draw too much attention to itself, which brings us to the next point . . .

Trying to Show Off

You don’t need to swallow a thesaurus to write well. It’s not necessary to stuff your prose with complex words or overly elaborate descriptions in order to demonstrate your worth as a writer. Keep the narrative focused and avoid so-called ‘purple prose’. Descriptive writing should add colour without bogging down the story – always aim to move the plot forward.

Starting the Story Too Early

Begin your story as close to your inciting incident as possible. Throw the reader into the action. If in doubt, cut it out: if you can omit preamble without it affecting the story, then it probably shouldn’t be there. If very necessary to the story, try weaving it in naturally later.

Unnatural Dialogue

Dialogue should sound natural but not exactly like real-life speech, which can be filled with ums and ahs and endless digressions. Keep your dialogue concise and relevant to the plot – but be careful not to fill it with too much exposition. Avoid using dialogue to explain things characters wouldn’t normally say just to push the plot forward. Something else to keep in mind is that people rarely directly answer the question they’ve been asked or give a neat reply. Don’t put words in their mouth: listen to your characters.

Too Much Exposition / Info-Dumping

While some exposition is necessary, you need to integrate it as smoothly as you can into the narrative. Long paragraphs of info-dumping can harm the pacing and flow of your narrative. Be wary, too, of trying to cram in all of your research and remember the ‘iceberg theory’ – your novel shows 10% of the information, but the other 90% (your research and preparation) is what gives that visible portion depth.

Underdeveloped or Stereotypical Characters

All of your characters – even secondary ones – should feel fully developed. They should have an inner life and behave in ways consistent with their personality. One way to get to know your characters better is to fill out character questionnaires, such as the one we previously made available. Completing character questionnaire can help you get to know them better and write them more authentically without overloading the reader with details.

Telling Rather Than Showing

Beginner writers can often fall into the trap of telling, rather than showing. While the advice to ‘show, don’t tell’ is well known, it remains one of the most essential techniques in writing. Striking the right balance is key: while there will be moments where telling is necessary, showing through action is often more effective. Observe how authors handle this balance in the books you read to gain a better sense of when to show and when to tell.

Imitating Other Writers

Often when we begin writing, we try to mimic our favourite writers. And there’s nothing wrong with this initially – it can be a good exercise in learning to write well. However, while this can help develop your skills, it’s important to find your own voice. One way to do this is by writing a letter to someone you know, recounting a story. This exercise can help you to write in a more authentic style. Another helpful exercise, as recommended by Zadie Smith, is the ‘noticing’ technique, where you observe the world around you and capture the details that stand out to you in your notebook. This can help you to cultivate your own unique perspective, which is key to writing with your own voice. It’s also more likely that when you find this unique perspective, you’ll write more from the heart. It’s not just about crafting the perfect sentence: it’s about having something to say, saying it in your own voice and saying it passionately.

Writing a Novel is designed to support aspiring fiction writers to develop their craft over six months, with courses in London (at Faber’s HQ in Hatton Garden), Newcastle and online.

A six-month programme of seminars, sessions will cover all the essentials of novel writing – including character, story, structure, plotting, voice, dialogue, conflict and more.

Find out more about the next iterations of Writing a Novel here.