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Category: Clarity Series

This is a series of posts on the topic of writing clarity, or writing clearly, designed to help writers better reach their audience.

You’re Too Close to Your Own Draft to See What’s Wrong

An open book with pages in sharp focus at the center and blurring toward the edges, illustrating the concept of losing editorial perspective on your own writing.

You’ve read it too many times. You’ve moved paragraphs, cut sentences, softened the opener, tightened the close. The draft has been through multiple rounds, and you’ve been careful about every one of them. And it still isn’t right. At a certain point, more revision stops being useful. Not because the writing is beyond help, but […]

Some Writing Problems Aren’t About Editing

Two business professionals on opposite sides of a canyon gap, one extending a document toward the other who reaches but cannot quite receive it.

If your writing is unclear and you can’t figure out how to fix it, the instinct is to revise again. That’s usually the wrong move. As an editor, I’ve asked this question more times than I can count: “What’s the main argument here?” The silence that follows is always the same. Not because the writer […]

What to Do When You Get Three Different Editing Quotes

A man in a business suit with comically short trousers and sleeves, illustrating the idea that an editing quote that doesn't fit the job is like a suit that doesn't fit the person.

You ask for help with your first draft, and three ballpark quotes come back at $200, $800, and $2,000. Now you’re stuck. You don’t have a clean way to judge the gap in your manuscript when comparing editing quotes, and the fear creeps in fast. Pick the low quote, and you might miss serious problems. […]

Why Editing for Small Business Writing Is Not a Luxury

Business report with charts and pen on a warm desk surface, beside a cup of coffee and a notebook with glasses.

I’ve watched this scene play out more times than I can count. The first draft looks “good enough.” The owner hits publish, posts the service description, sends the proposal, or queues the email sequence. The words make sense to them, so they assume the words will make sense to everyone else. Then the quiet damage […]