Help for writing in English

For something I spent 2.5 seconds writing... feel free to improve it. We mean what you know!

 

Read more english books would be mu recommendation. It's a great way to learn new fancy words too! Yay.

 

Like you, I write in English even though English isn't my first language. My advice to you, for what its worth, is to read as much as you can in English and to write as much as you can in English. Practice is the only way. If you can find a native English speaker to read your stories that will help. The other tip I would give you is not to be afraid of using expressions translated from your native language. An example would be euphemisms for killing someone - we've all heard and read the usual English ones, but something translated from another language is new and interesting.

 

Practice. Read aloud. Write often, read widely.

edit: Oh, and audiobooks/youtube vids. Many a time I have stumbled onto the correct pronunciation of a word that my mind has twisted into other sounds.

The above also helps to get a catalogue of accents/personalities in your mind, especially if you live in an area where there aint many English speakers to begin with, or not many folk at all for that matter.
Best of luck.

 

May I ask what your native language is? Because translating between different languages can be a very different experience depending on what the two languages in question are, especially how closely related they are and how similar the cultures of the speakers tend to be.

I know others in this thread have emphasized exposing yourself to more English, and that's definitely important. I'd like to add that having a bit more of a technical understanding of the differences between the two languages may help you pick out what kinds of mistakes are most likely for speakers of your language when using English, and help you recognize which kinds of things you need to double check with a native speaker. For example, if you're coming from a language with no tense morphology (i.e. Chinese), you may need to be extra careful with English verbs to make sure they're in the right tense. If you're coming from a language with more tense morphology than English (i.e. Spanish), you'll have to be careful of those extra pesky context clues that we use in English to make up for the missing tense markers. And in any case, keep in mind any cultural differences that come with the language difference and make sure to check your references to things you see as common foods, traditions, etc. to make sure they still resonate with an English speaking audience.

And don't forget to brush up on English metaphors! Metaphorical language can differ greatly across languages, but not using it at all can make your writing feel a little flat and overly literal.

 

I already noticed a lot of great advice, so as a fellow non-native english writer have onelast practical tip: use the Thesaurus (you can find it online). This is a very useful tool that gives synonyms for pretty much all words in the english language and using it can greatly improve your prose, as it gives you words you might not have thought of yourself. Of course practice and getting used to consuming media in english are more important, but this can help you with a next step.