Leads

After reading the eReserve article about leads and doing research by searching for leads, I really understand the importance of a good, concise lead. It is very rare to find a bad lead, but I find uninteresting ones all of the time. I don't think it is bad writing as much as it is a boring topic. Boring topics can be a death sentence for a writer and their story, but it is always up to the writer to make a boring topic sound interesting. Even if there is nothing the writer can do to make people want to struggle through a piece that has no relevance to them, the writer still needs to include the story's relevant information. There are times, I believe, when a lead can be too good. I have read some stories that have leads that are so informative and well-written that I don’t need to read on. Good for lazy people like me, I guess. To make myself a more successful writer, I should first focus on what constitutes and good lead and try to answer as many of the 6 questions in my lead as possible (who?, what?, when?, where?, how? and why?).

This week’s grammar fail comes from a cameraman who was lucky to catch this vigilante grammar corrector.