Go Ahead and Read Aloud
Remember in second grade when Mrs. Mullen carped on and on about silent reading?
Well, Mrs. Mullen is no longer the boss of you, and I say you should read aloud… to help edit your work.
Reading Aloud Increases Comprehension
Studies have shown that reading aloud aids comprehension. This might be because it prevents our brains from editing as we read, skipping passed typos and words written out of order.
We’ve all read the memes that insert extra words, or words out of order.
In the past, I’ve used the text to speech option in both Microsoft Word and Google Docs to listen to my writing. It’s helped me identify passages where my meaning is unclear, and the words sound clumsy, but for self-editing purposes, text to speech doesn’t provide all the benefits of reading aloud.
Reading Aloud Helps Find Misused Words and Punctuation
When you read your work aloud, you’re less likely to skip repeated words.
Reading aloud can also help you find homophones (words that sound similar, such as pain and pane) and misused words. If you use a text to speech option to read your work, your homophones will remain in the manuscript.
While reading aloud, I identified several places in my text where I’d accidentally used hyphens instead of em dashes, and colons instead of semicolons.
Reading Aloud Helps Improve Your Writing
The rhythm of your words sounds different than it reads. When you read aloud, you’ll hear where the rhythm and pace are off.
I also found awkward word combinations when I read aloud. In one scene, (spoiler alert!) I had a character named Adelaide provide soup to my protagonist. The text said “Adelaide ladled soup…” which looks fine. However, after reading it aloud, I realized the words Adelaide ladled sounds like the beginning of a yodel. Adelaide now spoons soup into a bowl!
Was the sound of your voice just interrupted by a colossal clunk? Did you have to stop and reread your sentence? When we read aloud, we get a better understanding of where we’ve crafted long, compound sentences. You’ll also hear unnecessary phrases and words you use too frequently.
I Read Aloud My 116,000 Word Story
After applying copy edits, I decided I needed to read through my book one more time before sending it to the proofreader. Since I was going to read it anyway, I read it aloud. The whole thing. It took me fifteen hours. I found a ton of errors and made notes along the way on my reMarkable. When finished, I had a sore throat and about four hours worth of work to fix the errors in my manuscript.
Reading your work aloud can help you tighten up your prose, improve the rhythm of your words, and identify typos, but it is a lot of work. So much work that I wouldn’t recommend doing it until you have a final, polished manuscript. Do you read your work out loud?