Show Me, Don’t Tell Me

“Don’t talk of stars, burning above! If you’re in love, show me!
Tell me no dreams filled with desire, if you’re on fire, show me!
Here we are together in the middle of the night.
Don’t talk of spring, just hold me tight!”
Show Me from My Fair Lady

Think of your book as a court case. Would you, as the jury, believe the prosecutor if he screamed, “The defendant is guilty!!! …And I rest my case.”

No. You want proof so you believe beyond reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty.

Apply the same idea to your writing. What proof do you have to convince your reader that your character is bored, that her hero is unhappy, that his antagonist is delighted? Let’s look at an example.

Belinda was bored. She had a lot to do and her friends, while hilarious, had no idea what sort of deadlines she faced. Three C++ programs and an analysis of Moby Dick to write? She had to figure out how to make her excuses and get out of there, quick.

What’s the problem? I’m telling you she’s bored and has a lot to do, but I don’t tell you how she’s reacting to these facts. Let’s try again.

Belinda twisted her ring around her finger. A paper and three programming assignments. She crossed her legs. Maybe she could write the Moby Dick analysis first? She uncrossed her legs. No, Moby Dick would take much longer, better do the programs first. Belinda glanced once at her cell phone, pressing the side button to illuminate the little screen and see the time. Class in twenty minutes. She stood to stretch, and no one said anything, knowing her history with back pain. She pushed her chair back to its desk and straightened the other empty chairs around her, inching for the door.

What is different? I rely on shorter sentences to portray an anxious mood. There are descriptive verbs: twisting, crossing, uncrossing, glancing, stretching, pushing, inching. Can you see someone doing this? Too polite to say they want to leave, but showing you they want to, anyway?

The Point: Use small details to reveal the bigger picture without flat out explaining the bigger picture.

Movies and songs do this because they don’t have the luxury of 80,000 words to explain everything. Love songs describe missed phone calls, the smell of an old shirt, the empty half of a bed. Small details showing us the singer is alone and heartbroken, which is more powerful than the singer repeating, “Oh, I’m heartbroken, can’t you see I’m heartbroken?”

Treat each scene in your book as if it were a scene in a movie. What details would the camera show the audience?

Showing Through Body Language

Watch your co-workers, family, friends and enemies, the strangers on the street. Can you tell what is going on without hearing the conversation? Are they standing upright? Are their shoulders hunched? Are they looking away as they speak? Are they sweating?

Showing Through the Environment

Sure, maybe it was a “dark and stormy night,” but we’ve all heard that before. What about your five senses help you realize that it is storming, and that you wouldn’t want to be caught in the middle of it? Are the gnats gathering into furious swarms? Is the heat pressing against your skin, making you feel like you can’t breathe? Are the trees swaying? Can you smell the heavy dampness?

Showing Through Architecture

What about the buildings that your characters live in? Are they worn down, a sad testiment to what once was? By the way, don’t ever say “the house was worn down, a sad testiment to what once was.” That’s telling.

Show me the house is worn down by describing spider webs in the windows, so thick they prevent the full sunlight from shining into the room. Show me how the roof is badly patched with pieces of rotting bark collected from the nearby forest. Details, details, details.

Comment on the Show Don’t Tell mantra to enter in the Worderella free critique contest. Do you think it works? Are you tired of hearing it? If this is the first time you’ve heard about it, does it confuse you?

Books to Buy: Eight Ways to Bring Fiction to Life, How to Write a Damn Good Novel

Links to reference: Showing Through Dialogue, How to Avoid Too Much Backstory

This five part series is my participation in Lynn Viehl’s Left Behind & Loving It (LB&LI) convention. I’ll tackle a different facet of editing each day:

1. Monday: Put that shitty first draft away
2. Tuesday: Be brutally honest
3. Wednesday: Show me, don’t tell me
4. Thursday: Tell me, don’t show me
5. Friday: Focus on those nitty gritty details

Read more for details about winning a free Worderella critique at the end of this week!

Be Brutally Honest

Today we are going to work on being honest when editing. I always like to think of editing as having three major factors: being honest with yourself, with your writing, and with your audience.

First: Be honest with yourself

There are times when all you want to do it edit, and other times when you dread the idea. Whatever the case, ask yourself these questions before you begin.

• Are you tired? Take a nap before you edit so you are alert enough to notice mistakes.
• Have you had a bad day? Just come out of an argument? I suggest not editing then, because you’re upset. Everything is going to look bad to you, and that’s not constructive.
• Have you had the most wonderful day of your life? Don’t look at your WIP with rose-colored glasses. Realize that your good mood might make you think your writing is better than it is, which is also not constructive.

In other words, realize that your mood will change how good you think your writing is. Train yourself to be objective no matter your mood.

And if you become frustrated, or if your eyes start to burn from reading too much, stop. Take a break and come back to it tomorrow. There’s nothing worse than getting burnt out, because then you get lazy with your editing.

Second: Be honest with your writing

It helps to know what sort of writer you are, i.e. character-driven, plot-driven, etc, and then look for your weaknesses. I had you print your work in a different font yesterday so when you read it, the words themselves will look unfamiliar, thus helping you recognize flaws.

• Are your paragraphs more than five lines long? That’s a lot of exposition. We’ll discuss this tomorrow.
• Are you relying on dialogue to explain details? Better summarize it in a paragraph and move on. We’ll discuss this on Thursday.
• Does everyone sound the same? You’ll only know this by reading aloud. When you’re at a restaurant, try eavesdropping on conversations just to get a feel for how people really sound.
• Are you lacking setting? Keep the five senses in mind (but don’t info-dump), and you won’t go wrong.
• If you have to read a sentence twice, it doesn’t matter if it’s clever. Look at it this way… you had to read it twice to know what you are talking about, which means everyone else will have no idea. Rewrite it or get rid of it.
• If you find a page that has beautiful writing but has nothing to do with that chapter, move it somewhere else. If it doesn’t belong in the book, it doesn’t belong in the book. Save it later for another project.

This is what I mean by being honest is hard. You have to be strong enough to let go of that perfect sentence… because it turns out it isn’t so perfect after all. But whatever you do, don’t erase any of your edits, and don’t cross lines through your printed text so you can’t see what you wrote. You need to see where you came from to know where you’re going.

Third: Be honest with your audience

Sometimes when we get into the thick of writing, we forget we are writing for an audience. This is the time to look at your work from their point of view by keeping these things in mind while editing:

• Do you like your protagonist? Have you fully realized your antagonist? Make your reader care about your characters, even the bad guy, and you’re on your way to a solid manuscript.
• Do you know where everyone is in the room? What room are we in, anyway? Did you even tell the reader? Shame on you.
• Was someone out in the rain in the last chapter, and miraculously don’t have a cold or any sniffles in this chapter, only an hour or so later? Continuity is a big thing for readers, oddly enough. It helps to keep a timeline so you don’t run into this problem.
• Does anyone even talk like that? This is why you should read your dialogue aloud. If you’re stumbling while reading, change it. Reading aloud will also help with purple prose; if it sounds cheesy, it probably is.

Your reader wants to love you and your book, so please, help them. Your reader will notice if something seems contrived. Strive for a simple, honest story at its heart, throw some twists into the mix, and everyone will be happy.

Frustrated? Stay with me. Tomorrow we’ll discuss how that vague mantra, show, don’t tell. Comment with your questions, suggestions, or what you find hardest about editing to enter the free Worderella critique contest.

Books to Buy: Revision and Self-Editing, Manuscript Makeover: Revision Techniques No Fiction Writer Can Afford to Ignore

Links to reference: Proofreader’s marks, Editing Fiction, Twelve Tips for Editing Your Fiction, Writer’s Editing Checklist, Revise, Revise, Revise

This five part series is my participation in Lynn Viehl’s Left Behind & Loving It (LB&LI) convention. I’ll tackle a different facet of editing each day:

1. Monday: Put that shitty first draft away
2. Tuesday: Be brutally honest
3. Wednesday: Show me, don’t tell me
4. Thursday: Tell me, don’t show me
5. Friday: Focus on those nitty gritty details

Read more for details about winning a free Worderella critique at the end of this week!

Put that Shitty First Draft Away

I once read somewhere that there are three phases a writer will go through before a work is ready for consumption:

1. You write the first draft for yourself.
2. You write the second draft for your audience.
3. You write the third and last draft for publication.

So take heart, dear one, though you’ve only finished draft numero uno. It may seem like a gargantuan task now, but you’ll be at the third draft in no time at all.

First thing’s first: put that shitty first draft away, you’re gonna hurt somebody

No, I don’t care if you suddenly figured out what you need to do in order to fix that one chapter/scene/sentence. Print out the shitty first draft (SFD) in a font that’s different from the one you typed it in (I’ll explain tomorrow), put it in a special binder, kiss it, hug it, do whatever you need to do in order to say goodbye. Then hide it from view for a week at the very least. A month is better.

This time away from the SFD is imperative because it brings objectivity. The less you remember about writing it, the more you will read it like someone who has no idea what to expect from you and won’t have any reason to say “Oh, it’ll get better by chapter four.”

If you must write, start the next book. I bet you have a sequel all planned out, so this is the perfect time to start.

Once you come back to the SFD, don’t edit at the computer

Why? Because we read superficially at the computer. It comes with surfing the internet. Superficial editing, I like to say, is the same thing as revising. You’re moving main points around, and that’s not what we wamt.

Why? Because editing is not revising.

To revise is to alter what is there, to shuffle things around and perhaps make a bigger mess than you already have. To edit is to have the guts to slash or add a sentence/page/subplot if it will enhance the whole.

So find your printed copy and your favorite pen (I know you have one, we all do), crawl into your favorite chair, and get ready for the long haul. Because this is going to get messy. Comment with your theory on why it is so hard to put the first draft away to enter the free Worderella critique contest.

Books to Buy: Self-Editing for Fiction Writers

Links to reference: Editing: Do You Dare?, Self-Editing for Fiction Writers (an excerpt), and Self-Editing and Revising Your Fiction

This five part series is my participation in Lynn Viehl’s Left Behind & Loving It (LB&LI) convention. I’ll tackle a different facet of editing each day:

1. Monday: Put that shitty first draft away
2. Tuesday: Be brutally honest
3. Wednesday: Show me, don’t tell me
4. Thursday: Tell me, don’t show me
5. Friday: Focus on those nitty gritty details

Read more for details about winning a free Worderella critique at the end of this week!

Urgent Update: Free Writer’s Word Processor Giveaway

For you writers looking for a word processor that caters to you as a writer (i.e. something that isn’t Microsoft Word), you NEED to get over to Giveaway of the Day. For today only they are releasing the Liquid Story Binder, a program made specifically for writers.

Believe me, this thing is amazing. I thought I’d never leave MS Word… it’s my baby. I know more keyboard commands than a person should, I use MS Word that much. But Liquid Story Binder has embedded outline, timeline, and association modules so all of your novel information stays in one program. You can link to mp3′s for a customized playlist as you write. You can embed images so you always know what your setting looks like (for example), and create dossiers for characters. You can have each chapter in a separate file, and Liquid Story Binder is smart enough to link them together for when you print the entire thing out.

Plus, the program is small enough to install on your portable USB drive… so you can literally take all your notes for your novel with you. Outstanding.

There seems to be a slight learning curve, but the chapter outlining and character/chapter timeline modules have me sold. Get your copy now! You only have 18 hrs left by the time I post this entry (9am American Eastern time)!

In other news, I’ve grown tired of my blog and website theme, so I’ve changed it. I didn’t create the blog theme, but I think it’s perfect (for now, haha). I’m still tweaking the website.

Personal Themes Shining Through

Cynthia from Creative Writing Corner wrote an interesting post about how her life and history shapes the themes in her writing. It’s an interesting exercise, looking at how your life defines your writing.

For instance, I’m sure many authors have written about the relationship between fathers and daughters. But I only realized last week that both of my books (Catching the Rose and the WIP, Trentwood’s Orphan) discuss the topic. What happens when a daughter loses her father? How does that influence her and her decisions for the rest of her life? And what about the characters who haven’t lost their fathers… what am I saying about their relationships? A doubly interesting question, as I haven’t lost my father. What does this say about me?

I also seem to have my main characters travel at some point in their story, and not because they want to but because they feel they have to. This is probably a reflection of my childhood through pre-teen years, where my family and I traveled around the country so my dad could approve/deny grant proposals. Safe to say that I still don’t like to travel, but I do it. My characters are always pensive while traveling, always part of a group, but almost purposely separate. Alone in a friendly crowd, as it were.

So it seems as though my life has a heavy influence on my writing. Is this good or bad? Are you having the same experience? Let me know your thoughts. 

I will say that recognizing my pervading themes has really helped me tighten the WIP as I go through final edits. I can see the threads holding everything together, and the purpose behind everything. Pretty cool.

In other news, PubRants has written a quick post on the two most common newbie writer mistakes. Make sure you don’t do them. And Lynn Viehl is going to hold an online virtual workshop conference. I’m thinking of participating… maybe mine will be on editing the first draft once you finally complete it.

Researching Your Setting Using Google Earth

If anything deserves more attention in my research, it’s the setting. Not for lack of trying, though; it’s something I tend to obsess about, if you’ll remember, but the resources about my little village are sparse at best. This concerns me because character histories often depend on the character’s environment, so it’s risky not to know the nooks and crannies hidden in your location.

Enter Google Earth. I finally caved in and installed the free application on my computer. This, despite my misgivings that I would waste hours studying the landscape rather than studying how the structure of a material changes depending on the number of vacancies at the atomic level. (I’m so glad I graduated.) Heaven help me, I was at the computer for two hours squealing about all the little physical details that, without technology, I would have had to journey to the UK to see it myself.

Thanks to the internet, I did manage to find 1885 maps of the area. But seeing actual color photos of the landscape around the manor house, and the relative locations of local ruins Mary walks to when she needs to let off some steam… and then to see photos taken by other Google Earth users living in the area! Oh, when I found Wayland’s Smithy, I knew, I just knew, that Mary spent hours there as a child, and returned there when bereft as an adult.

And if this isn’t enough, I also installed Google Sketch Up, a 3D modeling application. People use it to make 3D renderings of buildings on Google Earth… you know what I’ll be doing in my free time pretty soon. Yes, that’s right, making mock-ups of my characters’ not-so-humble abodes.

For those of you struggling with details about your setting, take a peek at Google Earth. It’s free and works on all major platforms, it seems. If you’re writing historical fiction, you might have to imagine what the city looked like during your era, but many places (especially in Europe) still have the old streets and some of the old buildings to give you a better understanding of what is within walking distance, etc. If you’re writing a contemporary piece, you can watch traffic patterns, the weather, and more.

A great resource for anyone curious about the world, Google Earth is an awesome research resource for writers.

Finding the Time to Edit

This summer is the first time I’ve ever had a full-time job. Shocking, I’m sure. It’s led me to realize how spoiled I’ve been. As a student, I could stay up late writing and go to an early class without a problem, because I’d scheduled a two hour break in my day where I could eat lunch and take a quick nap to recharge for afternoon classes. No such luck with a full-time job.

I’m beginning to understand these adults around me who say they’ve started a novel, but can’t seem to find the time to complete it. When sleeping and writing compete for the time, writing usually wins for me. But now I’m not so sure. I come home from work exhausted after an 11 hour day so that it takes two hours, roughly, to get all my mental capacities back. That’s two hours I could have spent editing!

So to do my last round of edits on the WIP, I printed the entire draft and put it in a binder. I take it to work with me, and edit during my lunch break. I also try to sneak some edits in when I’m not on assignment. I had a goal to edit a chapter a day, but since I’m reading each chapter at least three times, I suspect my goal was a bit too lofty. (The good news is that I’m really liking the draft so far. It’s covered in pencil from my markings, but I’m finding more gems than rocks, proverbially speaking.)

So you full-time workers, do you have any advice for the newbie? How do you balance being a professional and a writer at the same time?

Developing Villainous Characters – Part 3

Just coming into my three-part series on developing villainous characters? Make sure to read my suggestions in part one and part two!

Give your villain/character a fatal flaw.
There are multiple movies that showcase this trick (Pulp Fiction, Scarface, Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Romancing the Stone), and often it is the fatal flaw that brings the villain to their downfall, rather than the hero being the ultra-smart, ultra-handsome hero that we know he is. It adds complexity if the villain is the reason why he doesn’t win. Here is a great list of phobias to help you.

Give the villain a good side.
Surprise your reader by showing the softer side to your villain so that they’re not so sure he’s such a bad guy after all. If he can show he has a good side, then he gains the reader’s sympathy and suddenly makes things more complicated. Now that’s putting some twists into the mix.

Finally, maintain control over your villain.
Don’t just let him disappear at the end of the book! Give your reader a sense of closure, even if you’re writing a series. Your villain must suffer some sort of punishment/consequence for their actions, fitting to their crimes. Or, better yet, let them get away with a couple of things so the reader gets blindsided.

Thanks for participating! I hope to have another set of series about setting and research, two of my favorite topics. If you have a topic you want to discuss, contact me about guest posting!

Do you have any other tips and hints for developing villainous characters? Leave a comment and let everyone know about it!

Developing Villainous Characters – Part 2

Just coming into my three-part series on developing villainous characters? Make sure to read my suggestions in part one!

For part two, we’re going deeper into the mind and actions of the villain. We’re going to try to see the entire plot from the villain’s perspective, push ourselves to the limits, yet attempt to moderate how far we push our villain’s actions. So let’s get going! First and foremost, here is something that really helped me get into the mind of my villain: I suddenly realized that…

The villain in your story is the hero of his own story.
We always hear how we should write each scene from a single point-of-view. That is, no head-hopping to get multiple perspectives within a single scene. This fact helped me realize that if I were to switch around each chapter so that I told the story from the villain’s perspective, rather than the hero’s, I would have a greater, more realized understanding behind the villain’s actions.

By doing this, I grew to love my villain almost as greatly as I love my hero (that is, heroine), and sympathize with him as things didn’t go his way. As I wrote one of the villain’s climaxes, which happens to be different from the heroine’s, I wrote it with tears in my eyes because of the unfairness of it all. Yet, when I wrote the same scene from the heroine’s perspective, I felt sad, but justified.

Which leads me to my next point…

Don’t be afraid to go beyond evil in describing the villains actions.
It seems to me that, as writers, we tend to write what we want to read. At least, that seems to be what I do. And for some reason, readers like to read about particularly bad people and see what happens to them.

I used to be the sort of writer who didn’t make my villain to mean, or his actions too hurtful. I thought there was enough evil in the world, why should I write about it? And then it occurred to me that it is how we face evil that defines the good in us. That led me to writing villains who really do hurt others. But I still held back. I could write the scenes no problem, even chuckling along with the villain as his plans unfurled.

Which meant I wasn’t making him villainous enough. Rather than chuckling, I should have been shaking my head in dismay, because that is the sort of villain I like to read about. I want to see a villain that is cruel, and suffers the consequences for it… but it needs to be bad enough to warrant said consequences. So if you’re cringing while writing a scene, or reacting in some other way, you’re probably doing something right.

That being said, don’t overdo it, either.
Only make your villain as evil as he needs to be for your plot, and no one else’s. A sweet romance like Bright Arrows doesn’t deserve a Hannibal Lector, the same way Barnaby Barnacle from Babes in Toyland wouldn’t do Silence of the Lambs any justice. Determine the theme and purpose of your work to define the level of evil and goodness which should occur. Certain actions and motives won’t work for young adult, others won’t work for inspirational fiction, etc. Read books in your genre to get a feeling for what is appropriate.

For part three, I’ll finish my series on developing villainous characters by helping you flesh out your villain even more by adding unexpected details.

Do you have any other tips and hints for developing villainous characters? Leave a comment and let everyone know about it!

Developing Villainous Characters – Part 1

Due to finals, graduating, and spending time with the extended family, I’ve missed about 75% of Eliza’s villain month over at Tales of a Fantasy Scribbler. I did want to participate, but couldn’t commit due to my, uh, other commitments. So here is the first of my three-part series on developing villains, as my way to contribute.

First, research villain archetypes and decide which is the basis for your villain.
To do this, read Stella Cameron’s wonderful villain archetype summary or Tami Cowden’s sixteen villains, and pick your villain’s basis to your heart’s delight. Every character, and therefore villain, most likely fits some sort of generic archetype, at least to help you begin molding.

Now, the nice thing about Stella Cameron’s villain archetype summary is that it suggests generic back-stories that help explain why the villain is the way he is. Use this to your advantage by using this as a template and adding your own details to the mix. Tami Cowden’s sixteen villains, in comparison, has brief descriptions of the villains based on their generic motive and how they might pursue their villainy.

Keep in mind that the best characters have the most detail. For example, we’re fascinated by Hannibal Lector because he is so precise, and unbelievably detailed about his heinous crimes… it is art to him, the ultimate luxury. The luxurious and sensual nature of his descriptions about murder and cannibalism are what fascinate us, despite ourselves. Such a little detail, but a defining one.

So once you’ve determined your archetype, the next step is to add details that make the villain believable, rather than shallow and silly. To do that, you need to…

Give the villain a motive.
This is very similar to #1, but now you actually have to provide the details behind the archetype. Are they a spurned lover? Were they thrown out of their family/job? Do they just not take insults very well? Or all three? Personally, I think the more motive you give the character, the better.

It’s not enough to say he is the ignored second son, for instance, if you’re writing about a bitter villain out for revenge. Sure, maybe the family didn’t treat him the way they treated the firstborn. That happens. But what if the firstborn stole the villain’s girlfriend? Or actively turned his parents against his younger brother, depriving the brother of nurturing, thus turning the younger brother into a villain?

Then again, sometimes it’s nature rather than nurture which turns our character’s villainous. Maybe your villain, for some reason, feels entitled to everything, and when she doesn’t get his way, it’s a personal insult. Or, perhaps she is just the jealous type, and never learned how to control it.

Of course, now that we have a skeleton, of sorts, that gives us an initial definition of your villain, here comes what I think might be the most important step when working on your villain. You need to make sure to…

Devote as much time defining the villain as you do the hero.
The hero and villain are supposed to be antagonists of one another, right? (You should be shaking your head yes.) A synonym of antagonize is “oppose,” meaning they must be opposite and balance one another. But if one character is weaker, then the duo is weak altogether. If you spend three months developing the hero, I hope you’re doing the same for the villain, for the following reasons:

1. One strong character cannot carry an entire plot.
2. If you over-develop your hero and under-develop your villain, your characters will fall flat because of the lack of balance.
3. One weak main character can ruin your plot.
4. When your readers ask why your character did/did not do something, it’s better to pull out a journal full of details about the character, rather than to sit there blinking.
5. It’s fun to develop the villain! My next post will go into more detail about why this is, even for those of us who don’t like to hurt our characters (therefore making our villain weak and laughable).

Do you have any other tips and hints for developing villainous characters? Leave a comment and let everyone know about it!