Questions tagged [description]
Painting a picture with a thousand words.
59 questions
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How to introduce a world that's alien to the reader
I'm writing sort of a space-opera and I was wondering what would the best way to explain everything about the world to my readers. The story is kind of a political intrigue, and it would be very easy ...
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When is it okay to "tell", instead of "show"?
One of the major mantras of writing fiction is "show, don't tell".
Is it ever okay to tell? When?
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How to create space
Recently, a few snippets of my fiction have received critiques along the lines of 'Does not give a sense of space'. Or 'needs more description, sights and sounds'.
I think where I am going wrong is ...
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How specific should descriptions of settings/appearances be?
Some people tell me there are not enough descriptions in my book, some say there are too much. How do you know how much detail is enough?
Is there like a rule of thumb for these things?
Do I leave ...
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3
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What's with all the hate on adjectives and adverbs?
Ok, I'm starting to get a feel for this, but I'm hoping someone can explain it more clearly for me.
I learned in all my English classes that sensory imagery is important, which naturally involves a ...
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How much detail is too much?
I've read a few amateur stories online and sometimes the author will include so much detail that the reader gets a little bored or distracted and forgets what the actual story is talking about. How do ...
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How to develop a more vivid and descriptive writing style
One of the problem areas that I face while writing my novel is that I often get stuck when writing descriptions. I do well when writing action sequences, when writing dialogues, when showing character ...
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What's Essential In A Combat Scene?
I've just been reading a bunch of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files books. Although they were the most enjoyable read I'd had in ages I always found myself skimming long segments that described involved ...
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How do I define smells I have never experienced?
I am a lifelong writer, who was also born without an ability to smell. I have been trained to engage the reader by applying the five senses, or as many of the five as is practical without becoming ...
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11
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How to describe skin colour, if "white" is not the point of reference?
A character looks at another character, skin colour creates certain associations. A character looks at himself, and associations would be shaped by society, and by what is "normal" in that society. ...
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How to refer to clothes without modern words ? (e.g: t-shirt)
This is a constant struggling point of mine. Most of my settings take place in fictional worlds often inspired by various parts of human history.
For instance, one of my stories is located in an ...
user19124
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How to describe a female character's figure without comedy?
Do you know a good way to describe a female character's figure?
I'm writing a fairly serious story, but the only way I know how to describe this is from comedy stories, where they work out some joke ...
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What are the limits to description in story writing? How do I know if I have crossed them?
Time and time again, I have been told that my unfounded focus on description distracts from the main story line.
I mostly write stories in English, which doesn't happen to be my first language but I'm ...
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4
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What's the difference between purple prose and vividly descriptive writing?
Elements of Style describes purple prose as "hard to digest, generally unwholesome, and sometimes nauseating." In short, it's ornate, contrived and breaks the narrative.
There's plenty of advice on ...
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How to write about what you don't know?
I am a strong believer in writing what you know. Everything I write is at least partially based on something that I have experienced.
My problem is that for plot reasons, I need one of my characters ...
7
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2
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How do I get rid of overused words in my story?
I did a word frequency analysis on my story. Unsurprisingly, the most over-used words often corresponded to passages where I was lazy with my description.
I'm tackling my over-used words "laughed" ...
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Any helpful tips on how to, better use description in my writing?
I feel as if, the novel I am writing will have a great plot and I have some creative ideas on where to go with it. My only concern is my ability to develop description through out my story. Any tips ...
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Describing body language?
This is something I've pondered before. I asked about one gesture on yahoo answers long ago. All I got was a guy saying that even he didn't know the term for it (it was the gesture where someone holds ...
user26166
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How can I write an annoying character without annoying the reader?
My story has a group of five refugees traveling across the kingdom. One of them is preachy and pretty much useless (unused to physical labor, trying to convert the heathens in the group). She's ...
user36961
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4
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Characters' tone/pitch in dialogue
How does one go about showing a characters tone/pitch while talking?
For example, if someone said something that someone else doesn't believe and they reacted like:
bullsHIIt
or
whaAATt
Where the ...
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How can I make a character who isn't a jerk seem like one?
I have an MC who, because of certain circumstances, everyone sees him as harsh and cruel at first. As they get to know him through the first few chapters, they eventually see he's nicer than they ...
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How to show a brief hesitation around a word
When we speak, there are often small pauses between syntactic units such as sentences. In writing, these pauses are signified by punctuation:
I can come if you want. (without pause)
I can come, if ...
user5645
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6
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Should a narrator ever describe things based on a character's view instead of facts?
There is something I find myself doing often while writing, and I don't even know what to call it, but I would like to know if its good practice. It happens when I'm writing from a third-person ...
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Facial expressions as part of dialogue - getting rid of a verbal tic
I noticed a verbal tic in my writing:
He looked surprised
He looked confused
He looked abashed
Sometimes twice in a row:
The prince looked abashed. “I- I thought I was being polite,” ...
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How much description is necessary?
I have trouble imagining things. With me everything is blurred, as if I were almost blind. That's why I find it hard to describe things. For example, the protagonists enter a castle. I have a very ...
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When is a lack of long, sophisticated words to describe an otherwise simple concept bad?
Reading books of Dan Brown and that sort (pardon my inability to produce any other relevant examples off the top of my head) gives off the impression to budding writers that novels need to have a ...
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Confusing writing in order to show how character is falling asleep - is it OK?
Generally, writing something confusing is not good.
On the other hand, a writer should show rather than tell. (Generally.)
What I'm trying to do is imitate the way one's thoughts get all muddled ...
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Describing a person. What needs to be mentioned?
When describing the physical features of my more important characters, I often don't add much. I of course describe important features, especially if they will be relevant in the story. For example ...
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How do I say that someone is black?
Sorry if this is an ancient solved problem to ask in 2019, but I googled about this and Quora isn't really answering me. I searched for the words black and race and politically as key-words on this ...
user37170
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Should I repeat character descriptions if a character reappears the second time too far into the story?
Should I repeat character descriptions if a minor character reappears the second time too far into the story?
For example, I have a minor character who is introduced and has a bit of involvement at ...
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Writing "hahaha" versus describing the laugh
When posting an excerpt of my book on a critiquing site, someone commented on my use of "hahaha" inside the dialogue instead of just having a laughing verb after or before it. They said it ...
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How much should I describe things or persons, that are not important for the story?
I discussed a book with a friend, and he disliked that the author described a person who is dying shortly after and has no further effect on the story over a page or more. The same would go for things;...
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What information about a fictional world is unnecessary?
I was able to gain some insight already thanks to How much detail is too much?, but I still need a more precise answer, because my details aren't bound to a particular scene.
I was searching for some ...
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How to describe a diverse set of characters without falling into purple prose or exoticism?
In my setting, a city was founded by people from all over the world, and developed in almost complete isolation (long version here). The story in itself starts several generations after the foundation....
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How to avoid pages of dialogue?
I'm starting my story with my protagonist found (by the police), bleeding at a crime scene. When he wakes up, he has no recollection i.e. he's lost his memory. He's interrogated by two Inspectors, ...
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Is it important to describe how the characters are dressed?
One thing that I never mention in my stories is how the characters are dressed. Well, except when they are being described for the first time, when the main character first meets them. How important ...
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What are some ways of extending a description of a scenery?
I find it very hard sometimes to describe a scenery, especially when the features are very bland, like you describe a city where all of the buildings are tall and look about the same or a plain with ...
user36239
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6
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Building a scene and readability
When building a scene at the beginning of a chapter for instance, before character interactions take place, what are the important elements to consider, and how long should the description be, before ...
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Am I breaking the "show don't tell" rule in the following passage?
Then, as if sensing my presence, the girl turned around. She looked
young. Probably sixteen or seventeen. She had long black hair, crimson
red lips, and a skin so pale it made me wonder whether ...
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How do I write about nerdy concepts without sounding like a tryhard?
How would one express nerdy gobbledygook without sounding like a technical tryhard? For instance, if I were to explain the backstory of something and it perhaps contained the word electromagnetic or ...
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In what order should I describe a setting?
For instance I'm describing the park of an art museum in a foggy day. I'm not sure if I should start with the fog, wind, grass, threes, walking paths, buildings, stairs or something else. Is there a ...
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Writing about drug induced hallucinations and paranoia
Not long ago I wrote a short story about a mathematics graduate student on the verge of a nervous breakdown. The young student is innocent and working to finish a difficult mathematical derivation ...
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Is a specific physical description of characters required, or l can the details be left to the reader?
Does a physical description have to be specific to make a character feel real, or can the physical description be general and the details be left to the reader's imagination?
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How to describe 4 main characters at once without overloading the reader with information?
My main characters first appear in the book all at once. How do write their descriptions so that the reader isn't overloaded with so much information all at once?
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How can I make description more natural to me?
Description is a weakness in my fiction. My understanding is that the first priority in fiction is to tell the story. Setting does this by providing props and indicating character mindsets, either ...
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How does a person go about describing a place/experience that they never personally experienced before, like a circus?
I've never been to a circus, and all the shows and videos I've seen about them don't give off the full effect.
How does a person go about describing a place/experience that they never personally ...
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Beginners can break rules too?
I came across several disciplines of writing which one must know while writing (especially beginners), concerning narrative conventions and the rules of story logic.
Some of the sources for this ...
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Difficulty describing a complex image in a single sentence
I am having difficulty explaining that the sun evaporated the fog that had brushed up against the blooming hills. When I add "with spectacular wildflower blooms", it sounds as if the sun ...
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First conversation scenes I've written (looking for errors, conventions, and improvements according to writing standards)
I would like to know if I'm doing something wrong (according to writing standards) in the following conversation and how to improve it to help readability, quality and feeling (making it more ...
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How to «show» an irrelevant detail without expressively «tell»?
Here is the environment of my short story: the adaptation of film noir into literature. The characters in the story are David Lynch's Rabbits and I can't find how to introduce them. In the David Lynch ...
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