Characters and actions

To be able to understand how your readers feel about your writing, you need to know what counts as a well-told story. This means finding the correct subject and verbs—characters and actions. A story is an account of real or imagined events with characters that do things—perform actions.

Finding the correct characters and actions means transforming nominalizations into verbs and finding the correct subject. This provides the following results for your sentences:

• They are more concrete.
• They are more concise because you do not have to use prepositional phrases.
• They are more logical and clear. You can link clauses with clear subordinating conjunctions, such as because, although, and if.
• They tell more coherent stories. Nominalizations let you distort the sequence of events.

Rules

Rule 1: Subjects

Make the main characters the subject of the sentence. This will show you whether you are telling a story with the correct characters:

1. Find the verb
2. Put either “who” or “what” in front of the verb to figure out who is performing the action of the verb. If this reveals that the verb does not point to a main character, you need to revise. For example:

   Wrong

   The barking starts during commercials. What starts? Barking. This is not a character!

   Correct

   The dog barks during commercials. Who barked during commercials? The dog.

Rule 2: Make actions verbs

Do not use vague verbs or nominalizations. Verbs should name important story actions:

Wrong

The thought occurred to me that I should leave early.

Correct

I think I should leave early.

How to revise

Analyze

Ignore introductory phrases and underline the first eight or so words in the sentence. Ask yourself these questions:

• Did you underline any abstract nouns as the simple subject?
• Did you underline eight words before you got to a verb?

Assess

1. Determine who the main characters are.
2. Look for the actions that the characters perform. Look especially for nominalizations.

Rewrite

1. Convert nominalizations into verbs.
2. Make your characters the subjects of those verbs.

Patterns

Subject of empty verb

The nominalization is the subject of an empty verb such as a form of be, seems, has:

The intention of the committee is to audit the records.

1. Change the nominalization to a verb.
2. Find the character that can be the subject of the verb.
3. Make that character the subject of the new verb.

The committee intends to audit the records.

Follows empty verb

The agency conducted an investigation into the matter.

1. Change the nominalization to a verb.

   investigation > investigate

2. Replace the empty verb with the new verb.

   The agency investigated the matter.

Subject of empty verb followed by nominalization

Our loss in sales was a result of their expansion of outlets.

1. Change the nominalization to a verb.

   loss > loss

   expansion > expand

2. Find the character that can be the subject of the verb.

   Our loss

   they expanded

3. Link the clauses with a logical connector:

   • simple cause: because, since, when
   • conditional cause: if, provided that, so long as
   • contradict expected clause: though, although, less

   We lost sales BECAUSE they expanded outlets.

There is/there are

There is no need for our further study of this problem.

1. Change the nominalization to a verb.

   need > need

   study > study

2. Find the character that can be the subject of the verb.

   We need

   We study

3. Make that character the subject of the verb.

   We need not study this problem further.

Nominalizations joined by prepositions

We did a review of the evolution of the brain.

1. Change the first nominalization to a verb.
2. For the second nominalization, do one of the following:

   • Leave it as is:

     We reviewed the evolution of the brain.

   • Change it to a verb in a how or why clause.

     We reviewed [how the brain] evolves.

Useful nominalizations

Refers to previous sentence

You can use a nominalization when it links the current sentence to the previous sentence:

Kubernetes automates repetitive administrative tasks. This automation frees you to complete other work.

Replaces “The fact that”

The fact that you intended to hurt her feelings is baffling.

Your intentions are baffling.

Names object of verb

I accepted what she decided.

I accepted her decision.

Familiar concepts

Some nominalizations are so familiar you can use them without causing issues:

The software installation process takes about 5 minutes.

Absent characters

Sentences without characters are difficult to understand.

Abstractions as characters

Inanimate things and abstractions can be the character of the story if you make them the subjects of a series of sentences that tell a story. This is especially true when the abstraction or nominalization is something that the reader is familiar with:

• The right to bear arms is guaranteed by the second amendment. The right to bear arms is a flashpoint in political debates.
• Software installations are complicated. The installation process can take up to 30 minutes.

If the character is an abstraction or nominalization, make sure to rewrite any additional abstractions or nominalizations so you don’t confuse the reader.

Noun + noun + noun…

When you have a long compound noun phrases, reverse them and connect them with prepositions. If a few words make better sense when they are combined, leave them combined:

• Supply chain risk management framework > “Framework to manage risk in the supply chain”
• University student housing allocation system > “System to allocate student housing at the university”
• Customer data privacy protection policy > “Policy to protect the privacy of customer data”