The 10% Solution

One of my goals for this year was to read two writing books on my ever-growing to-read pile. I've already read one of them: The 10% Solution by Ken Rand. This book is subtitled "Self-Editing for the Modern Writer," and that's what it teaches you to do.

It's a short book (less than 100 pages) with two main parts. As promised, this book teaches you how to trim your writing so it's crisp. The first part discusses Rand's theory of editing, which is basically a left-brain/right brain approach. The left side of your brain tends to be more analytical (the editor part), while the right brain is more creative (the writer part). The trick is to focus on one task at a time, either writing or editing. I admit this is something I have problems with, as I tend to ease into a writing session by editing my previous day's work. The second part of the book discusses some of the most common words to look for when editing, such as "that," "of," and "was." While these may not always be problem words, they can indicate wordiness. Some of these words are ones I try to avoid in my writing, but it's still useful to have a refresher course. In summary, this is a useful book for any writer and packs a lot of punch per page.