Although not as tricky as adverbs, adjectives (words which describe a noun, a thing) need to be handled with caution. It is easy to give full rein to your creativity and use adjectives lavishly, but you run the risk that they may obscure as much as they reveal. Go for accuracy instead. Rather than saying that The man that was big and fat, say The man was corpulent, or The enormous man. You get the picture.

If you can’t forswear adjectives altogether, avoid using them in pairs - you’d be amazed at how many people do. It can set up a predictable rhythm in your writing: the long green grass, the thin old woman, when what you want to do is to keep the reader on their toes. So, sometimes use one, sometimes use three and sometimes leave them out altogether. In this way your prose will keep its spring.