Style
Style is the way a person uses language, either written, or spoken; including grammar, spelling, and the word structure. Every writer has his or her own style, and every type of publication demands its own style.
Common usage is not always good, but good usage is always common, i.e., it is easy for the intended audience to understand.
Grammar
Whether you are a diehard advocate of Strunk and White, or a modernist champion of breaking the rules, your grammar must make your meaning plain. A shortage of punctuation can make your prose run together and muddle your intentions. The wrong verb tense throws timing of events. Worst of all, poor grammar tells the reader you don't care whether or not she understands your writing.
Read your prose out loud, or better yet, have someone else do it. Do they pause and stop where you intend them to? If not, spend more time clarifying your grammar. Handy tools are grammar texts, word-processing grammar checkers, and erudite friends.
One need not stick to the strict grammatical lessons of high school or college to be lucid in prose, but too much liberality muddles otherwise professional-sounding compositions.
A modern example: Some avant-garde writers are now dissing quotation marks. I find this appalling, BUT if the dialogue is easy to follow, then I bow to modernity. Unfortunately, this new style throws many readers. One wonders if the author is simply tired of quotation marks, or if they only want modern readers.
(Then again, while I welcome change, I must insist that what I read is easily understandable. I like works that send me to the dictionary, but deplore dialogue that leaves me wondering who is saying what).
Words
The correct word delivers your message to the reader without her realizing she has read it. The wrong word puts a sudden confused halt on things. Use simple words that everyone understands rather than banal phrases that distract from your intentions.
The lady saw the intruder, ran, and called the police.
The visage of feminine beauty witnessed the invasive predator's entrance through the lower window, rapidly removed herself from the premises, and utilized a communications device to alert the authorities.
You can picture the same basic scene from both sentences. Yet, the first one is crisp and immediate - you don't see words, you see a scared lady run to call for help. The second sentence announces the writer's vocabulary and causes the reader to hesitate long enough to construct the convoluted phraseology into a coherent picture.
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