Editing Pitfalls....Faulty Parallelism

If you are like many Indie authors out there, a lot of editing on your books is done entirely by yourself. whether you just started writing after an amazing dream you had, or you are an expert in the use of the English language, mistakes can easily be made and not caught when editing a manuscript. The best trick is to keep a list of those common mistakes to look for as you go through the finished product to make sure you have not fallen victim to a common pitfall for writers.

What is faulty parallelism? This is a grammatical error that makes matching ideas in a sentence seem uneven or falsely related to other words that do not make sense. For example:

The mother's goals include teaching her children to write, get the whole house clean by three each day, and cook enough to have leftovers put away.

This sentence is deceptive. Though, the reader may understand what was meant by this, the sentence leads you to believe the children are being taught to cook leftovers and clean the home.

Here is an example of how to write one of these sentences correctly.

The candidate's goals include winning the election, enacting a national health program, and improving the educational system.

Do you notice how for each part of the list there is a new, appropriate verb?

I hope this helps you a little and stay tuned for more editing posts and other writing tips and news!