Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-10502460-20180901022714/@comment-35711173-20180905010145

The lack of a few commas isn't going to sink you. Those uber-long spaghetti sentences will.

"The camera zoomed down on that house next to the Wallis's, the one that had been sold last month, and a feeling of dread came over me as I remembered that the man who had bought the house had a wife and two children who were younger than me, but I had never met them and I remembered Mom commenting that none of the neighbors had seen much of them since they moved in."

I get lost trying to climb to the end of this.

Breaking it up to five sentences took under a minute. No key words or ideas were touched. All I did was remove the burdensome conjunctions and add periods in their place. This also varies sentence length more and makes the read more interesting and expressive.

The camera zoomed down on that house next to the Wallis's. It had been sold last month. A feeling of dread came over me as I remembered that the man who had bought the house had a wife and two children who were younger than me. I had never met them. I remembered Mom commenting that none of the neighbors had seen much of them since they moved in.