I console myself with the fact that this was four years ago, before I was wiser and so much more experienced . . .
Here are some examples from my Work in Progress.
"I'm not sure I can do this," Shannon said nervously.
"I'm sorry you're having to go through this," Glenn said sympathetically.
Okay, what's wrong with these sentences?
The words the characters are speaking already imply the emotions. We know Shannon's feeling unsure, which indicates that she's nervous. Glenn said he was sorry, which indicates sympathy. By tacking the words "nervously" and "sympathetically" onto the speech attribution, I'm bogging down the sentence, I'm being repetitive, and I'm also not trusting the reader to figure out for themselves how the characters feel.
I hate to say it, but I'm finding a lot of these types of instances throughout this book. I'm so grateful I decided to go through and rewrite it.
And please, if you'd like to send me any snippets to be looked over, send 'em on over through my website. 500 words or less.
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