Author Confessions: Show and Tell for Authors

It wasn’t too long after I started writing that I heard the phrase “Show, not tell.”

This is different than when you were grade school and had to bring something to show to a class and tell them about it. To be honest, I don’t remember ever even doing that. Either I’m too old or it never happened at the schools I attended.

When writing fiction, the goal is to help the reader experience things the way the protagonist is experiencing them. That means helping the author feel, hear, see, smell, taste, touch, and connect to the emotions of the character whose point of view is being written from. Oh, and avoid using the words see, hear, taste, smell and feel if possible. See the linguistic gymnastics we have to jump through to bring you a story that engages all of you?

The reality is, how often do you notice all of those things when you walk into a room? Take smell for instance. If there are fresh baked cookies the aroma would grab your attention. Or if my puppy decides to leave a “gift” in a room I will usually detect that odor. If I exit my front door with the lilacs in full bloom that perfume will grab my attention. Otherwise, it’s not as easy to always tune into that if a person is engaged in conversation, or some other sense is triggered.

Now some people are more attentive to things than others, and when we write a scene we don’t need to include every sense. Notice above that I didn’t write that I smelled cookies, poop, or flowers. Instead I used more evocative words: aroma, odor, and perfume to describe those scents. To go even deeper into a point of view, I might even describe a memory that those stir. For instance, the aroma of those cookies could remind me of when I would come home from school when mom had been baking cookies. I always felt loved, wanted, and welcomed.

How about hearing? My wind chimes may sing or clatter depending on the wind. My dog might yelp, whine, whimper, yelp, or bark. A bark could be insistent, aggressive, or maybe even pleading. See how that draws you a clearer picture in words about the sounds? Especially if is accompanied by him sitting on his hind legs with his paws scraping at air, or his teeth are bared, or he’s jumping to nip at my behind! All convey a different image and emotion.

Seeing is a challenge. Trying to describe things needs to oftentimes go further than “the lilacs were in bloom.” I might instead say: The tiny lavender buds opened to greet the sun. How do you relate the color of a cardinal? Yes. It is a red bird. But perhaps the little black mask contrasting with the vibrant crimson flashing against the clear blue sky gives a more vivid appreciation of that particular variety of winged friend, and reminds us that spring is here. Or it might be the vibrant yellow and black of the male goldfinch that is so different from it’s more muted winter tones that signals summer is coming.

Touch is something to describe as well. My dog’s hair is soft. He has hair, not fur, so he doesn’t shed. But that wavy coat becomes like silk after he’s had a haircut and petting him is soothing to my soul and he definitely loves that attention. A win for both of us.

To write that the brownies were delicious is telling you I like brownies. What if I write instead: the brownies were moist and the gooey fudge mixed with the melting ice cream created all kinds of pleasure as a reward after accomplishing some difficult and exhausting task. Now you’re hungry.

Emotions can be hard. She felt sad is a simple statement. The weight of grief enveloped her like a heavy, damp, scratchy, wool blanket. The air stank of wet dog and she could hardly breathe. Oh, if she could only close her eyes and let it all disappear. To no longer cry would be an answer to prayer.    While it can take more words, it helps the reader get a deeper sense of the emotion. There is a great tool called the Emotion Thesaurus which helps authors look more closely at the physical ways emotions are expressed so that more visual means can be used to describe them.

Another instance of telling instead of showing is when an author merely describes what happened. “Peter bowed his head and prayed,” or “Alice recounted how her day had gone.” In some cases, because I’m a Christian author, I prefer that the author write the dialogue of the prayer. It can be short and sweet. Why? Because faith is important and it can helps someone who is not acquainted with the beauty and ability of us to talk to God. They can see how it can be done. As for Alice, if the reader doesn’t already know the content, and it is important to the story, the author should write the dialogue.

I’m being very simplistic here and I’m not saying I always do this perfectly myself. I just had some edits for some other authors for some amazing stories and yet there were these brief moments that struck me because they weren’t written out. I want the reader to stay fully engaged with the characters.

Telling a story is like painting a picture with oils, there’s color and texture to it. We want our stories and characters to be multidimensional. Not every sentence has to be flowing with elaborate description but where it counts the author needs to bring the reader deeper into the characters heart and mind.

The hardest part of that when dealing with the less enjoyable emotions, is that the author is forced in many ways, to go there too. For that reason, show and tell for authors takes on a much deeper meaning and adds an extra layer of skill to learn to write well.

Now I want a brownie.