suggestions to improve my English so it sounds more natural

Hum. Tough one, especially since I'm not a native speaker either, but I can see the difference between your writing - even in this post - and a native's. The most obvious things I spotted :

- Some of your "I" are written in small letters.

- Some of the words you use are different from those a native speaker would use. Ex : "I know my grammar is sufficient to write a correct sentence." A native would say it differently. They might write, "I know I have a good enough grasp of grammar to write a correct sentence", for instance. (I wouldn't mind a native confirming this).

- Your formatting could use some work, too. You might want to break up this chunk of text in smaller paragraphs.

- You could also use more commas. I don't know how often you use commas in your first language. They don't use them all that much in English, but a couple sentences here could use a comma or two : "Actually, one story I wrote giving the character's name is Emily, and the location as Chicago, but still people can make out that it is an Indian."

I'm not sure if you sound Indian, but I could tell you're not an English native speaker by reading this post, mostly because of all the details listed above.
I don't know of any book that could help, except perhaps books about the English language itself and all these little rules and irregularities that make us poor foreigners go through hell to learn them. Small details can easily tag you as a foreigner. For instance, when you see a German mucking up his grammar, his nationality can be pretty obvious
(I precise I'm not making fun of the difficulties people have to learn English. I wouldn't be in a position to, anyway.)

If you want to break into the American market, read books by Americans. That's really the best way. Reading can help a non-native speaker (or a native speaker with poor language skills) pick up the cadences and grammar of the language. What you want is an intuitive grasp of the language, and that's what reading tons of books in the target language will give you.

Also, a minor formatting note: Don't leave spaces before your periods and commas.

Could you write a story set in India? If you're writing for an American audience you'd still have to work on your style so the writing sounds natural to native speakers. And I agree with Ravenlocks, the best way to do that is to read American books. But you already have an understanding of Indian life and culture that someone like me (Midwestern US native) could never acquire. Then again, if Chicago is what fascinates you, go with it. Write what you love

Still, I'd love to see more novels about India. Oooh, or fantasy set in India, that would be awesome!

jessicaorr said:

Could you write a story set in India? If you're writing for an American audience you'd still have to work on your style so the writing sounds natural to native speakers. And I agree with Ravenlocks, the best way to do that is to read American books. But you already have an understanding of Indian life and culture that someone like me (Midwestern US native) could never acquire. Then again, if Chicago is what fascinates you, go with it. Write what you love

Still, I'd love to see more novels about India. Oooh, or fantasy set in India, that would be awesome!

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Yes, read books, but also listen to Americans talking - watch films, TV, listen to the radio. It's all pretty easily available wherever you are these days. And pay attention. Listen not to what they're talking about but how they're saying it. Pay attention to word order, word choice, idiom, contractions and so on. Try transcribing some scenes to make yourself think about how the sentences fit together.

You look to have a good basic grasp of English. I'd say you're at that very difficult final stage in learning a language where it's things like preposition use and word order and word choice that will trip you up. These are things that native speakers and readers pick up over a life time of immersion. For example, you write:

Actually one story I wrote giving the character's name is Emily and the location as Chicago but still people can make out that it is an Indian.

A native rendering:

Actually, I wrote one story with a character named Emily and a Chicago setting, but people could still tell it was written by an Indian.

So I had no trouble understanding you at all, but I could tell you weren't a native speaker.

Immersion is the only solution. Read English and American books of the type you want to write. Then take the next step and study the structure of each sentence. Also, watch English/American movies and TV series on DVD, so you can rerun scenes over and over, soaking up the dialogue rhythms, diction, vocabulary.

I'm curious why you want to write in English rather than your native language. Are there not enough markets? Or do you want to write in both languages? Do you compose in English, or do you compose in your native language and then translate? I used to translate a lot of my poems and stories from English to German, which I was studying. I found it tough, but fun and interesting.

I used to teach English to non-native speakers -- mostly higher-level students who were already using the language at school or at work -- and this issue came up a lot. Their English was readable but was easily distinguishable from a native speaker's writing. Like the others here, I recommend reading as much as possible, from a variety of sources. Read fiction, magazines, textbooks, websites, blogs, etc.

I also used to recommend that my students find a weekly podcast or something else of that sort to listen to. Knowing the spoken rhythm of English can help your writing a lot. You might search for a podcast that focuses on an interest of yours... or just check out npr.org, where they have tons of stories (everything from hard news to personal narrative) in streaming audio format. The announcers don't speak nearly as fast as people on, say, political talk shows, and the accents are fairly neutral.

Probably the best thing to help you would be finding a native English speaker who you could meet with in person to go over your writings. I think it's difficult to do this effectively on a critique forum like Share Your Work -- while critters can point out your errors, it's more useful to have a discussion about the reasons behind those errors, and a further discussion about ways to correct those errors. The Internet's great, but I think real language polishing goes above and beyond what can be done online.

Americans don't tend to speak English as formally as non-native speakers. You may have a good grasp of grammar, but we tend to take liberties here with language. One tip: use contractions. "I am Padma" to "I'm Padma." We take a lot of shortcuts.

I'll concur with the others above: read, listen, watch TV or movies.

Americans are very informal in their speech patterns. Your writing is very formal. Americans take a lot of short-cuts when speaking. You don't. Americans use a lot of colloquialisms. You have to have a grasp of those to write the way Americans speak.

Chicago is a great city, but the it's people have an unusual accent and attitude. Why did you chose Chicago when it would seem to be off the radar (see: a colloquiamism) with a lot of non-North Americans? I'm really interested in knowing (most Americans would say 'real interested in knowing.')

Anyway, I am interested. Why Chicago?

I agree with the others; read books set in the USA, watch television shows and movies. You could have an Indian character who lives in Chicago, of course.

jessicaorr said:

Could you write a story set in India?

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Or an Indian in Chicago? Go with your strengths.

read, speak, and use it every day. mingle with native-speakers. listen. observe. learn how they say things. read through the bulletin board and see how native speakers write and talk. watch tv. watch movies. and read. read a lot.

the only way to really learn the language and write and speak like a native is to, well, write and speak like a native, at all times. proper grammar and usage are just the foundation. you need to absorb the nuances, the colloquialism, the subtle differences in how people construct their sentences and use words. the more you use it, the better you'll get.

May I suggest Strunk and White's- Elements of Style? It is a must have for every writer and it's not expensive at all.

I think there's a difference in the feel of British English vs American English, and also the formal and informal context. Much of what sets a speaker's tone is the use of contractions, the dialect, and the everyday phrases that are common to that place.

Ex. here is Israel people say in terms of a generalization of knowledge: 'It is known that lowfat milk is better for you' vs what I as an American would do, 'They say that lowfat milk is beter for you. A British speaker might put it: 'One would think that low fat milk is better for you.'

Ex: car trunk or boot, car hood or bonnet, curb or kerb, fries or chips, etc can set the tone as written by and American or by a British speaker. Further variation in the US can be in sounds like: tire with a long I for up north, or: it'll sound like tar in the Carolinas or Georgia, or: tare in the midwest.

http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/ is the link to Elelments of Style so you don't even need to buy the book.

Interesting.

It's easy to tell English isn't your native language because of small things. For example: very formal writing. You said, "I am Padma" whereas most would say "I'm Padma" (not that there's anything wrong with the formal version). Also, the lack of contractions in general. "Are not" instead of "aren't", "what is" instead of "what's", etc. Finally, your sentences are very much correct, just stiff. They don't flow in the mind.

Everyone had it right when they said to read books and stories written by native speakers. Listen to how other people speak, too. There will be differences between American and British English. You'll also find slight nuances in American English, such as the difference between the west and east (ex: pop v. soda v. coke). Try to remember the old saying, "Listen to the sound of words."

I disagree somewhat with watching TV. TV is not indicative of reality. If you were to speak like TV characters and/or write like that, you'd probably get weird looks. TV could work, however, if you watched the news or something similar to that.

Finally, practice. A lot. Practice every chance you get. You never get better if you don't use the language. Maybe you could find somebody to be an email buddy with and chat in English?

Hi Padma,

I'm not a native speaker, either, and here's an exercise I find very useful:

Apart from reading a lot (that's a must), grab a few novels written in different periods and styles, then copy a few random paragraphs by hand into a notebook. That will give you some idea of the authors' style and grammar. Then try to come up with your own sentences, using the same syntax structure as the sentences you've just copied. It's fun!

Pay special attention to all the little period/dialectal things, especially in the dialogue. Try to copy and rewrite a bit of Scottish dialect from a book, some Creole accent, Indian, etc. Pay attention to the syntax and word choice. Agatha Christie did a great job giving Poirot a slight French accent -- could you do that?

A writer who attempts to work in a foreign language is very much like an artist who tries to paint while blindfolded. But it's doable. It's practice, and nothing else. Good luck!

dpaterso said:

Agh! The thought of having my eyes tied! Not that, anything but that, I beg you!

-Derek

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Oh s**t! Blindfolded! There, you see!

padnar said:

Hi ,
I am Padma . I have posted some of my stories
here and I received some suggestions that my
stories are fine but they are not like native English writing .
I was working as an Editor so i feel that I know my grammar
is sufficient to write a correct sentence .
what i want to know is what is the difference between
Indian style and Native style ? Actually one story I wrote
giving the character's name is Emily and the location as Chicago
but still people can make out that it is an Indian.
I want to get published, so is there any book which will help me .
pl write
padma

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Padma,

Your English is good, but it isn't quite "native." I can't tell if you're making typographical errors (we all do) or if it's second language problems, but there are grammatical errors in your posts. Here's how I would edit the post above:

"My name is Padma. I have posted some of my stories here, and I received feedback that my stories are fine, but they are not written in native English. I have worked as an Editor, so I think that I know how to write grammatically. What I want to know is, what are the differences between Indian style and native style ? I actually wrote a story about a character named Emily, set in Chicago, but people could still see that it had been written by an Indian. I want to get published, so I'm looking for any book that could help me. Please write."

Less formally, that would be:

"Hi, I'm Padma. I've posted some of my stories here and received feedback that my stories are fine but they're not written in native English. I've worked as an Editor, so I feel I know enough grammar to write a correct sentence! What I want to know is, what's the difference in style between Indian writing and native English writing? I wrote a story about a character called Emily and set it in Chicago, but people could still tell it was written by an Indian author. I want to get published. Is there any book out there which would help me? Please write!"

I don't think this will prevent you from getting published, but it will almost certainly prevent you from presenting yourself as anything other than an Indian author. It's like an accent. You *can* get rid of it, but it's a lot of effort once you're older than say 11 or 12.

This doesn't have to stop you - Arundhati Roy used some Indian inflections in her "God of Small Things." If I were you, I'd make a virtue of your own particular voice, and write as an Indian. If you want to write about Emily in Chicago, write from the point of view of, say, Sita, who moved there recently.

The only other route I can think of is to become part of a crit group where some members don't mind doing extensive line edits.

Good luck!

Hi mate

I send you an email .
Look sometimes you have to be proud of what you are you can't change it . You may use it to your advantage . I am half Polish and Half Irish and what I can write about it traveling and culture mix .

Ravenlocks said:

Also, a minor formatting note: Don't leave spaces before your periods and commas.

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padnar said:

HI friends ,
Great, thanks for all the info . I have saved the page so that I will be familiar
with the nuances of writing correctly . Why I am interested is ,I want to be published
like any other writer and earn some money.
Presently I am working as a reporter for Ground Reporter and I have contributed articles to Orato,com . I wrote about three articles . They have also published my articles but for free .

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Somehow I'm unconvinced my advice has made a difference.

Fresie said:

A writer who attempts to work in a foreign language is very much like an artist who tries to paint while blindfolded. But it's doable. It's practice, and nothing else. Good luck!

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English is my second language, by the way, and I sold my first novel. So it's very doable. But it does take time and effort to really not just learn, but absorb the language. speak, write, and read every chance you have, even when you don't "have to." Think like a native, too. For me, that's the only way.