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I did a word frequency analysis on my story. Unsurprisingly, the most over-used words often corresponded to passages where I was lazy with my description.

I'm tackling my over-used words "laughed" and "chuckled". For example, there is a paragraph:

"No 'we'll see', bring him around. I’m old, you have to listen to me." Abel chuckled. "Take care, Sara."

"Chuckled" feels rather generic; I don't want it repeating over and over. When I write "chuckle," I picture Morgan Freeman or Ian McKellen expressing with a faint chuckle mild delight with the humor of his previous statement and genuine caring for and approval of Sara. All the visuals and the character dynamics are there for me. I can see it vividly in my head, but can't find the words to express it.

I studied the thesaurus and failed to find alternate words to describe this interaction.

This is a specific example, but I'm sure every writer has their own words that just keep popping up over and over in their story. And it seems so natural and essential, I don't know how to fix it.

How do I remove the overused phrases, and what do I replace them with?

Standback
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Eric J.
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  • It sounds like what you're looking for is a single word request, which is handled over on English Language SE. I'll flag this to be moved over there. – Thomas Reinstate Monica Myron Jul 14 '16 at 21:34
  • @ThomasMyron: I'm not very sure this is a single word request. I studied the thesaurus thoroughly and did not find a match. What I need is a better way to convey that interaction. – Eric J. Jul 14 '16 at 21:35
  • Probably a phrase request then. Either way, this is exactly the kind of thing that English SE deals with. – Thomas Reinstate Monica Myron Jul 14 '16 at 21:38
  • @ThomasMyron: This won't work as a single-word request at English.SE, they have some very specific guidelines. – Standback Jul 14 '16 at 21:39
  • @Standback It should fit phrase requests just fine. Or is there something that I'm missing? – Thomas Reinstate Monica Myron Jul 14 '16 at 21:41
  • Eric, this is what we call a "rephrase request", where you ask us to help you rephrase a small snippet of writing. On Writers.SE, we've decided to declare this type of question off-topic, because rephrasing one particular snippet of text isn't something that can help anybody else - each author will have their own very specific snippet to be reworked. – Standback Jul 14 '16 at 21:43
  • That being said, I think you have an interesting question here, that can be a little more broadly applicable. You're worried about overusing a word that's common, but notable. You feel like you're being repetitive, and want to avoid that by swapping the word out. – Standback Jul 14 '16 at 21:45
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    Here's the thing, though: swapping the word out in some instances may not actually be the solution to the problem. You can write "chuckled" once, "chortled" a second time, "laughed warmly" a third - and the reader might still find that repetitive! What I'm saying is: there might be better ways to solve your problem than re-writing these two lines of your story. – Standback Jul 14 '16 at 21:48
  • I think there are probably two issues here. One is help with this specific phrase. The other is a more general approach to avoiding repetitive use of common words in favor of more evocative description. Seems correct to migrate this question to English.SE and open a second, broader question. – Eric J. Jul 14 '16 at 21:49
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    So I'd suggest you ask about your problem, and that would be totally on-topic for us, and I hope very helpful to you. Would you like me to edit your question to make it about the base problem, instead of asking to rephrase the particular line? – Standback Jul 14 '16 at 21:49
  • Would you like me to edit your question to make it about the base problem Thank you, that would be helpful. – Eric J. Jul 14 '16 at 21:50
  • @ThomasMyron: English.SE has specific guidelines for single-word requests and phrase requests. Each has checklists this question doesn't currently meet, and I don't know that they'll be down with just offering a bunch of synonyms - after all, the single word for chuckle is chuckle :P (although they might be fine with synonym-requests; I can check. See e.g. http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/335369, under the synonyms tag.) – Standback Jul 14 '16 at 21:57
  • Eric: I've edited. Let me know whether you feel this is still in a form that's helpful to you, and that this is doing a decent job describing the problem you're having? – Standback Jul 14 '16 at 22:03
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    This Q/A might be useful: http://writers.stackexchange.com/questions/21387/eliminating-repetitive-which-was-statements-at-the-end-of-sentences/ – Lauren-Clear-Monica-Ipsum Jul 14 '16 at 22:40
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    @Standback Nice edit. Eric, I'm glad we have a question addressing this common problem. – Goodbye Stack Exchange Jul 15 '16 at 19:56

2 Answers2

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Possibly the underlying issue is that you're trying to portray a particular sentiment or idea, and you keep doing it in the same way.

In your example, it seems that you're trying to show that Abel is attempting to get a serious point across and show his firm stance on a situation, but not being too strict or overbearing about it. Him chuckling after saying that sentence would certainly get that point across, but in order to get around the repetition, you may need to entirely restructure the sentence.

"No 'we'll see', bring him around. I’m old, you have to listen to me."

The glimmer in his eyes told Sara that he wasn't being serious, but she got the sense that if she failed, that glimmer would quickly fade to be replaced with something less friendly.

She nodded wordlessly, and he dismissed her.

"Take care, Sara."

Obviously it can be anything you want, but this shows that by restructuring the sentence a little, you can completely subvert the need for having to find a direct word replacement.

It's fine to repeat words over and over, every writer will have something that they constantly fall back on, the trick is to identify it (which you've already done). Then it's just a case of picking up on the those instances when you're editing, and remove a few to make the story more balanced.

In the future you may never use the word chuckled again because you'll be hyper-aware that it is one of the words you have previously overused, but at that point you'll probably write something else that becomes too abundant in your work. Then it will simply be a case of repeating the process for that word or phrase.

Community
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Mike.C.Ford
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I would start by asking myself if that behavior 'types' the character or not. When other characters think of this character, is that the first thing that comes to mind? Is it part of the characterization? Then I would ask if the behavior or attitude I'm attempting to emote from that character can be expressed another way? Is the chuckle the typifying hallmark of this attitude and outlook on life? Or are there other ways to portray this?

Since you identify with specific actors, perhaps you could do some research to collect other scenes with these actors portraying the sorts of things that match your character's personality. This may give you some additional visuals to use as you are making your word choices.

Escalation or gradation is also a possibility. Someone who audibly chuckles every single time will have a certain feel to them, something the other characters (and you as the author, as well as any beta-readers you have exposed your work to) will recognize. Audibly chuckling all the time might actually be considered strange or weird, depending. However, feeling humor or attempting to project humor can be done a number of additional ways: a smile, a smirk, a rolling of the eyes, body language, narrative of the internal emotions, and more.

Just a few thoughts and methods to tackle this that I hope are helpful to you.

nijineko
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  • Seems spot on. I would ask "comedy or social critique"? Someone who adds a "chuckle" or "laughter" after everything is most likely not a well liked person....let alone the Dread Smirk. "They seem to know something we don't"... – Doctor Zhivago Jul 15 '16 at 15:23