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There are many guides to good writing, including Strunk and White's Elements of Style and the CP Stylebook. Although it is not within our purview to provide an exhaustive writing guide, here are three principles to keep in mind:
1) Clarity of writing follows clarity of thought.
2) If readers can misconstrue something, they will.
3) Always remember the audience you are writing for.
Here are George Orwell's six rules:
1) Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2) Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3) If it is possible to cut out a word, always cut it out.
4) Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5) Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6) Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.
Keep in mind that paragraphs are units of thought, not units of length. In newspaper writing, short paragraphs are preferred because they help break up blocks of text. Long sentences, like long paragraphs, should be used judiciously:
"At times a writer may indulge himself with a long sentence, but he will make sure there are no folds in it, no vaguenesses, no parenthetical interruptions of its view as a whole; when he has done with it, it won't be a sea serpent with half of its arches under the water; it will be a torch-light procession."
-Mark Twain
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