Writing Advice I Hate Hearing, Part One: Adverbs

I started writing on Medium thirty days ago and in that time span, I have seen more articles on how to be a great writer than there are actually great writers. It is truly a wonder. As a reader and a writer myself, I have heard these all before in articles and YouTube videos aplenty, most often titled, “How To Become A Better Writer Instantly”, or “Guaranteed Ways To Become A Successful Writer”, etc. “How To” this, and “The Most Effective” that. I can’t imagine how it looks to someone fresh and new trying to suss out what is “right” and what is “wrong”.

I am really tired of people making everything seem so black and white in an industry built on creativity and imagination.

Yes, I am triggered.

Adverbs are the devil incarnate.

I hear this so much. It is usually followed by a quote from Stephen King’s On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft which goes as follows:

“I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs, and I will shout it from the rooftops. To put it another way, they’re like dandelions. If you have one on your lawn, it looks pretty and unique. If you fail to root it out, however, you find five the next day . . . fifty the day after that . . . and then, my brothers and sisters, your lawn is totally, completely, and profligately covered with dandelions. By then you see them for the weeds they really are, but by then it’s — GASP!! — too late…I insist that you use the adverb in dialogue attribution only in the rarest and most special of occasions … and not even then, if you can avoid it.

Where to begin. Let’s start with what an adverb is. To keep it simple, it’s a word that modifies another word. It can modify an adjective, verb, another adverb, or an entire sentence. I’ll be speaking to adverbs that modify verbs since that it where Mr. King takes such offense.

For example, “He moved quickly.” “She said passionately.” So on and so forth.

Why adverbs get a bad rap

They are very easy to use and therefore, easy to overuse and then become a crutch that we rely on. They can also be used in all-to obvious ways such as, “he ran fast”. Running is fast!

The problem is that people read that Stephen King, a house-hold name and one of the truly “famous” writers of our time, says “The road to hell is paved with adverbs” and they interpret this as “kill all the adverbs”.

That’s not what he is saying and if you read enough Stephen King, you will see that he uses quite a lot of adverbs himself, but he uses them (for the most part) in dialogue attribution. Some uses though are so perfunctory they make me think, “You really couldn’t have described that better?” For example, “he said conversationally.” (Pg. 26, The Shining). They are having a conversation! It is already implied by their back and forth in the scene that they are speaking conversationally.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I have the utmost respect for Stephen King. Having also almost been killed in an accident, and having the desire to publish as much and as often as he, King is one of my favorites.

The problem is that many take this advice and oversimplify it when really they should be focusing on the second part of that quote from On Writing about how adverbs are like dandelions and are to be used sparingly.

When adverbs work well

To describe a great amount in a small amount of time, for the purpose of preserving or changing the pace. Now, to elaborate.

Dialogue attribution in emotionally charged scenes.

Let’s say you have a scene between two characters hiding, about to get into trouble, or sneaking out, what have you. You’ve set the scene well, the reader can envision it perfectly, and they are so enthralled that their breath is stuck in their chest as they wait to see what happens next.

There is back and forth of whispered dialogue but then you take three lines in the middle of it to describe how the features of one character have narrowed, their eyes turned to slits, their jaw clenched, in purple prose.

You could have just said, “What are you playing at?” George whispered suspiciously. And then the heated back-and-forth continues, with the tension continuing to rise instead of halting.

Adverbs can be used to describe dialogue in succinct ways while making sure the reader is still feeling whatever emotion the scene is trying to convey.

During a change of pace in action.

Let’s use Joe Abercrombie’s introduction chapter to “The Blade Itself”. Joe has a very modern, unique writing style so I feel this is a great example.

It is a scene full of action, suspense, and chase. We start right in the thick of it with Logen running through the woods. He is not in a good situation. After two and a half pages of action described in detail, the dramatic moment comes when he falls from the cliff and Joe writes, “Logen turned over slowly in the air, limbs flailing pointlessly, too scared to scream.”

The scene ends in the next few sentences. It’s also the first time he uses an adverb in the whole chapter and I don’t think that this is an accident. We are at a pivotal moment where we don’t know if he will live or die. By describing the action of Logen falling as “slowly”, and his arms as “pointlessly” flailing, we have a perfect moment during this simple change of pace to really grasp that Logen is plummeting off a cliff. The shorter sentences slow our reading pace, giving us the feeling that time has also slowed for our protagonist as he falls through the air.

How to actually give advice on adverbs.

I have finally arrived at the point.

Stop telling writers what they can and can’t do when it isn’t hard and fast grammar or publishing rules, and even then some of those rules can be bent.

If Kurt Vonnegut can say, “gruesomely capable” and Stephen King can say, “insultingly toothy”, then you can do whatever the hell you want.

If you use an adverb in every single sentence, however, that may be too many and it could become difficult to read. There is an entire grey area in between the two where the magic of storytelling takes place, and that is what makes storytelling wonderful.

Don’t get hung up on things like adverbs quantities before you even finished your book. Get your first draft done. Worry about the rest later.

I am a full-time community manager and a writer of dark fantasy short stories and novels. My current project is a three-part short story series called “The One-Horned Heretic” with part one available on Amazon for $.99. I write on Medium mostly about writing advice, with the occasional one-offs on other passions of mine. If you’d like to follow along on my indie-writing journey, you can learn more about it on my website.