Exclaim!

It's the end of your first NaNo week! How many words have you guys gotten in so far? I'm rooting for you all the way!

(and if you were wondering, I edited 24,000 words and wrote 10,000 so far this week, so I'm write on track with you. Get it? Write?)

Today I want to talk to you about the one little punctuation mark that I hate, the one that I wish didn't exist... except in the few and far between times when I need it.

Exclamation Points

I don't like these things. I just don't. They peeve me. They make dialogue sound silly, they make exposition look childlike... And too many writers use them in their everyday adult fiction.


Please, for the sake of my sanity (and your readers'), stop.


I have a rule: only three exclamation points are allowed in any given novel manuscript.

Three.

That's it.

No more.

(You can do less if you want.)


They're only used if someone is shouting. Not if they're happy to see you, not if they're excited and jumping up and down. No, they're only used for shouts. And they're never used in exposition.


Why?


Because exclamation points, more than any other punctuation, draw the eye. And we're trying not to put so much emphasis on the punctuation. In fact, those little marks should all blend into the background of your dialogue and exposition so much that your reader doesn't notice them.

Otherwise, they're just not doing their job.


So, no more exclaiming. Add descriptors instead, if you want someone to be overly jolly.


There are times when we need exclamation points. I'll admit that. But those times are very few, and very far between.

Trust me, I'm an editor. And a writer. And a reader. 

[love and punctuation]

{Rani D.}