How to improve our writing? – part 3

If you are  beginner in writing, you could have fallen into the “Purple Prose Trap”.
What is it exactly? I’ll show you.

The ‘purple prose’ always contains a lot of weak words, instead of vivid nouns and active verbs. Some writers believe, that purple prose is more descriptive for readers, but they’re wrong. Purple prose is as harmful for a novel, as steroids for muscles. It is distracting and exhausting.

Instead of:

Tom Cooper smiled cunningly and his small, clever dark-brown eyes dancing viciously with mysterious and predatory fires,

Write:

Tom smiled, his eyes danced with mysterious fires.