As one of the biggest culprits of inflating a word count, repetition is something everyone does that writers have to teach themselves to avoid. If you listen to people talk, they will repeat themselves numerous times even if they don’t have a memory problem. It’s natural for us to say one thing multiple ways. (How many times have I already told you we like to repeat ourselves? That makes four, and I’ve only written four sentences.) While that works in life, it does not do well in print. Writers have to be concise in order to keep the attention of readers.

I want to address three main areas where writers need to be cautious of repetition: wording, theme, and purpose. Editing out repetition in stories takes hard work. I’ve tried to narrow down how to address each issue, but you’ll have to discipline yourself to accomplish this level of editing.

1. Wording

This is the most obvious facet of repetition in writing. It could be using the same word or phrase repeatedly. You might be starting your sentences or paragraphs with the same word consistently. It could even be describing actions or emotions in the same way all the time. 

Word repetition is the easiest to catch and fix. You can use the Find tool in your word processor and search for words you think are being overused. It will show you how many times you’ve used the word and where so you can replace it with something different. You can also fix this problem by asking the people who proofread your book for anything they noticed that was repetitive.

2. Theme

When I say theme in this post, I am referring to the lesson or emotion the reader encounters as they read the story. Each chapter in your book should have a different feel to it. You don’t want every chapter to make people cry or tell them how bad drugs are for people. Readers need change to keep their interest.

You need to label a theme for each chapter in your book. If you’re a plotter, do this before you write. If you’re a pantser, you can go back and assign one to each chapter after you are done. Make sure they vary. If you end one chapter on a sad note, make sure the next one illicits a different emotion from the reader. If you tackle a heavy moral issue in a chapter, try to make the next chapter lighter in tone so your reader has a mental break.

3. Purpose

The best books are written with purpose. Each word is carefully selected to improve the writing and drive the story forward toward its goal. You need to be concise. This means that no chapter, scene, or sentence should repeat another that accomplishes the same goal. If you show us in chapter one that the protagonist plays the piano, don’t tell us in chapter three that he plays the piano.

Start on a broad level and work your way to a narrow one. Assign a main purpose to each chapter. Then look at those all listed in a line to make sure no two chapters have the same purpose. If they do, delete one. Next, look at each chapter individually. If there are multiple scenes, assign each scene a purpose and make sure they don’t overlap. Repeat identifying purposes and combing for repetition on the paragraph and even sentence level. Then do it all over again for the rest of the chapters. I know it’s time consuming and seems overwhelming, but this is how you create high quality writing.

Final Thoughts

Repetition is not all bad, but these three aspects of it do not always help your writing. There is a thing to be said for repeating something so the reader knows it’s important, but that only works if you aren’t being repetitive with other parts of the story as well. Going through your writing to delete the unintentional repetition will help you tell a better story in a clearer way.

Thanks for reading!

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