In the spirit of reflection, Pro Writing Tips offers you our 10 most popular writing tips of 2008.  Happy New Year’s, and here’s to another year together.

1. 10 Ways to Lose Your Credibility

   It’s easy to lose your credibility as a writer. Here’s how!

2. 100 jump-starters to cure your writer’s block

The last time I discussed writer’s block, I mentioned that the best cure is to simply write. To expand on that, I have created a list of 100 random jump-starters to get your writing juices flowing again. You can pick any that suit you, or close your eyes and point to one on the screen; it doesn’t matter which ones you do, just as long as you’re working that creative brain of yours.

3. How to write a résumé, Part 2: Making your résumé shine

Make no mistake: Your résumé is a sales document.  Although many might think of it as a dry list of your experience, it is more like junk mail.  Any given job listing draws dozens, if not hundreds, of résumés — the tips here will help put yours on the top of the stack instead of in the trash.

4. Transitive verbs, weasels, and you

Transitive verbs are those that take an object. Intransitive verbs, by a cruel twist of fate, are verbs that don’t take an object. But wait! There’s more.

5. Free your mind with FreeMind

I’m willing to bet that most of you have never made a mind map, and that those of you who have haven’t done so since a teacher made you. To both groups I say this: You’re missing out. Mindmapping is a prewriting exercise in which you create a branching tree of concepts for your writing project.

6. The 8 parts of speech

It is important to know the eight parts of speech to craft intelligent, and intelligible, sentences. You use them all the time, but if you forget the difference between an adjective and adverb, you wind up coining new usages and infuriating copy editors.

7. Top 5 grammar myths

Tired of following grammar “rules” that don’t make any sense? It will probably astound you to know that these rules you think you have to follow aren’t even real rules. They’re myths; legends passed on from generation to generation of confused writers. You don’t have to be a victim anymore.

8. Ten homophones that will ruin your life

We already did a post about commonly confused words. This list deals specifically with homophones that are easily mistaken. Homophones are words that sound the same, but are spelled differently and have different meanings. (No wonder English is the hardest language to learn!) These sets of homophones can trick even the most talented of writers.

9. Incorporating imagery in your fiction writing

Imagery is a very important aspect of fiction writing, one that many beginning writers tend to forgo in favor of heightened dialogue or plot.

10. How to write a résumé, Part 3: Writing a cover letter

A cover letter is a way of introducing yourself. If a stranger walked up to you, shoved a business card in your hand, and walked off, would you call them? Of course not. You don’t know who they are or why they want to talk to you. By the same token,  you have to introduce yourself before you ask for an interview.

This article was written by John Roach http://prowritingtips.com John is a writer and copy editor. You can follow him on twitter at @johnwroachiii. To see more posts click here

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