# Description and Imagery: How?



## weechlo (Oct 22, 2017)

So it's been... about three years since I've done any serious writing (and by serious writing I mean any writing beyond bare-bones synopses and note-taking for DnD campaigns), and I'm trying to get back into it for NaNoWriMo this year. And I've started writing something and noticed a problem almost immediately.

I cannot figure out how to describe _anything.
_
All my stuff is "and then this happened, and then this. He did this. Blah blah blah, he said." 

And I'm like "This is not how good writing looks."

So if you guys don't mind, remind me how to add descriptions of emotions and surroundings and such in your writing. Just help me out here real quick, just a quick refresher on... you know... writing gud.


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## Heliotrope (Oct 22, 2017)

Fun question! Here are my top tips: 

1) Don't think of story sequence in terms of "and then... and then... and then...." Instead, think of your sequence like "So.... but.... so.... but.... so....." This way you always have a scene/sequel continuum which will make things more interesting for your readers. So instead of a paragraph going along the lines of: 

"and then this happened, and then this. He did this. Blah blah blah, he said."

It would look more like: 

"This happened, _so _he. _But _then this happened. _So he... " 
_
2) Use Chekov's advice for describing settings:

“Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.”

Basically, _show don't tell. _Don't tell the reader "the moon shone bright in the clear sky." It's too vague. Focus on small, intimate details that only the narrator would notice. 

It might be helpful to post a passage of your writing if you want specific advice


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## weechlo (Oct 23, 2017)

Heliotrope said:


> Fun question! Here are my top tips:
> 
> 1) Don't think of story sequence in terms of "and then... and then... and then...." Instead, think of your sequence like "So.... but.... so.... but.... so....." This way you always have a scene/sequel continuum which will make things more interesting for your readers. So instead of a paragraph going along the lines of:
> 
> ...



I'm working on something right now, actually; a little probably non-canon passage with the express, specific purpose of working on imagery and description. Nothing like writing a passage about your MC being trapped in an eldritch abomination's home turf and having his brain picked apart for 'secrets' to work on showing rather than telling and describing emotions.


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## Heliotrope (Oct 23, 2017)

Cool. Well if you felt ready to post it then it might gives others specific thoughts on what you may want to focus on, or points to consider


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## Garren Jacobsen (Oct 23, 2017)

It is time now to turn to one of my favorite tools for understanding description, the Pyramid Of Abstraction. This pyramid shows that the more concrete your descriptions the richer, deeper, and easier to understand the prose becomes. For example:

To understand when something is concrete I'll write about love and the word dog. Love is an abstract concept. It's different for everyone and has a different meaning within s given situation. It's fuzzy and it can cause confusion.

The other term, dog, is also abstract. We don't know anything about this fog. When I hear the word dog I think of Yorkies since I interact with that breed the most. A k-9 officer would probably think of whatever breed they use for drug sniffing. And yet another person might think about a golden retriever. Yet another might think of a Black Russian Terrier. And even if we had a consensus as to breed we would still differ on age, temperament, size, coloring, state of being, and so forth. To understand what this dog is we need to use concrete terms like baring teeth, growling, wagging its tail, having its color be black on its back and golden brown on its face, and explaining what it's fur or hair is like (trimmed short long and debris strewn etc). 

So, how to make something more "descriptive" go concrete. For example, let's suppose you want to describe a punch, you'd talk about the clenched fist and the motion of the body, straight, looping hook, uppercut, and also body positioning and the puncher's physical state. Then you'd want to concretely describe the punchee's state of mind and physical state after receiving a punch. For example:

John clenched his fist and growled. Without thinking, he shifted his weight from back leg to front, throwing his arm straight forward, connecting with Bill's nose. John smiled as blood rushed down his friend's face. Bill tumbled backwards, eyes rolling into the back of his head, he wouldn't be waking any time soon.

This isn't a great example, but we see that John is angry and reacting and throwing a punch with the intent to injure. He know that injury did happen and that Bill was knocked out cold. Furhter, we know that this was a jab since it connected on the nose and he threw his arm straight forward.


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## FifthView (Oct 23, 2017)

I'm going to combine and add to the advice Heliotrope and Brian Scott Allen have given.

First, a caveat:

Often when we begin to put words on paper, we're dealing with two or more perspectives, the narrator's and at least one character's. Unless you are writing in first person, there's _always_ a narrator and a separate character. And for me personally, this is where a lot of the trouble comes, when these two perspectives war with one another.



weechlo said:


> All my stuff is "and then this happened, and then this. He did this. Blah blah blah, he said."



So for example, saying "He did this, He said" is the narrator (who may be the author) looking _at_ the character, from a distance. I suspect "this happened" also arises from that perspective of the narrator. So these passages can appear or feel aloof, separate, kinda _out_ of the scene and story rather than _in_ it.

If we are writing in third person, using those third person pronouns is unavoidable, heh. But we don't have to stay so aloof. We can use both the narrator's perspective and characters' perspectives together to create a sense of closeness, of being really _in_ the scene.

The first step is to imagine yourself in the scene, either as one of the characters whose POV you are using or as a kind of disembodied narrator standing alongside them.

So how to do that?  Brian's mention of the Pyramid of Abstraction points at one way to avoid aloofness. Abstraction is aloof, a perspective from above what's happening. So...

1. Use concrete nouns to describe what is in the scene. Lots of them. You are not looking down at the scene; no, these concrete things are all around you (if you are _in_ the scene...)

2. Don't write as if you are separate, looking _at_ those things. Rather, those things just are, of their own accord.  What I mean by this is that when you are writing what a character sees, hears, feels, smells, you don't use those words but instead just write what's there:

Not this:  _John saw a large crow flying toward him. He could hear the flapping of its wings as it appeared to be struggling to stay airborne. He could see something large and dark dangling from its talons._

But this:  _A large crow flew toward John, its wings beating at the air furiously as it dipped and rose, dipped and rose. A dark shape swung below it._

I make no claims for the greatness of the last quick example above, heh. But it illustrates what I mean. When you say, "A large crow flew toward John," then the fact that "John saw" is a given, you don't need to say that he saw.

3. MRUs help tether the/a perspective to the descriptive elements in a scene. Helio's  "So.... but.... so.... but.... so....." is another way of describing MRUs:  motivation-reaction units. In this term, _motivation_ isn't a character's inner motivation but rather some external, concrete, objective thing or event that motivates a reaction from a character or from other things in the environment. This series of cause-effect will make the descriptive elements more real, more important, and will help interest a reader. Characters don't just do this, then do that, then do that; no, _this_ exists, prompting a character to do _that_:

_A large crow flew toward John, its wings beating at the air furiously as it dipped and rose, dipped and rose. A dark shape swung below it. John crouched and raised his shield. What new devilry approached ?  He drew a slow, deep breath to steady himself and waited._

Just a final little note. Mary Kowal on the podcast Writing Excuses often distinguishes short stories from novels by saying that readers want the quick, emotional payoff from a short story but want immersion from a novel. Immersion in a world. Being there. This idea of immersion as a goal struck a chord with me. For me, it helps when I allow myself to immerse in a scene while I'm writing it. I know I can sometimes get in a hurry to reach a plot point, but sometimes letting myself relax, be present in the current scene, helps me to see around me, take it all in, and write what's there.


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## Svrtnsse (Oct 23, 2017)

I've written a few articles on descriptions for the blog here on MS, and while it's me saying so, some of them are pretty good. One to start with is this one: https://mythicscribes.com/writing-techniques/writing-descriptions-1/ - it's more about describing static imagery rather than events and actions, but it may still be helpful.


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## Mytherea (Oct 23, 2017)

So. I can't tell you the why's of description or the reasons why one description works better than another--I'm not that smart--but I can give you a few exercises that might help. I'm assuming the issue you're having is describing things vividly so that they feel real, right? 

1. Grab one of your favorite books or favorite writer's work. Scan through till you find a scene or description of a place or character that's particularly evocative, that summons the movie or the pictures in your head, that feels, for whatever reason, real. Got it? Right. Now, transcribe it for yourself. Take your time. Really dig into the meaning of that description. Now, put it away. Hide the book. Hide your transcription. Go make yourself some coffee or take a walk or a nap, something meditative to occupy your time for five, ten-ish minutes. I wouldn't recommend doing anything tied to story, though. Now, come back and write that description again. The focus isn't so much to get it "right" and have it word-for-word the same, just to try and capture the original description's meaning. It's like with acting, how an actor will memorize lines, but also memorize the meaning behind those lines, so in case they forget the actual wording, they can ad-lib and have it still mean what it's supposed to mean. Sometimes, you'll get the exact same wording as the original, sometimes stuff will deviate, sometimes you'll forget things, and sometimes you'll add. Which is all valid. Just focus, as you're writing, how the--oh, crap, I'm going to go down the emotional side of it but--how the description feels. Like, the shape of it. The construction behind it. The texture, the size, how long the writer dwells on one detail or how many details there are. Maybe there aren't any. Why? 

2. Watch a movie/TV show. Pick a scene. Summarize it: what happens? How does it happen? Cool? Good. Now, novelize it. Write the scene out as if you're writing for someone who's never seen it. What details do you need to build the scene? Focus on those. Where is it happening? Who's it about? Who's involved? What's it sound like? Do a bit of extrapolation, what might it smell like? If someone is drinking, what's the container feel like? What's the drink taste like? Then, slowly, start building your novelization. It might take more than one pass through. Just keep adding details. Then, look at this overwritten mess and ask, what can I cut? What's the absolute core of this scene? Does the library really need to be described in such detail or can I get away with just saying "library"? Do I need to describe that veggie-shake or can I just say, "kale shake" and rely on a reader knowing what color/taste/texture kale is? Now, chop it down to half its size. 

3. Go someplace you're familiar with. Spend half an hour observing it. Jot down notes about the place. Size. Color of the walls. What kind of place it is. People. Noise. Is there music playing? Smells. Now, start trying to play with contradictions. Is it a big place but only has a couple people in it? Is it an old place but has a very modern charging station sitting in the middle? Tall ceilings but squat furniture? Now, snag a character and stick 'em in the place. What're their first impressions? 

4. Google up some pictures of people. Pick one and describe the person. Now, describe them as a character. Okay, describe them in one sentence, trying to capture both what they look like and who they are (try to keep the sentence under thirty words). Now, describe 'em in three sentences. Now, five. Describe them as if this is a person you (or a character, whichever works better for your internal visualization) are meeting for the first time. Now, describe 'em like you've known them for ten years. 

5. Pick one of your locations from your story. Describe everything you can think of. Build the place in your head and take a leisurely stroll. Maybe go browsing through Google till you find locations that look _somewhat _like what you're aiming for. Steal stuff from that, put it in your place. Make it this massive amalgamation of images. Right. Now, pick a character from the story and choose three details that character would probably notice about the place, then write a description using only those three details. Now you've got a description that's doing double duty, showing the place but also building the character. 

6. Emotions tend to be tied to impressions and character, and how close the narrative perspective is to the viewpoint character. There are quite a few ways to go about weaving in emotion, and it's hard to give you pointers without knowing the stylistic approach you're using. Like, I use either first person or third person close (sometimes very, very close), so my narratives are almost always colored with the character's thoughts. Some might say this is a lazy way of working in emotion, but it's what works for me. If you're writing with more narrative distance between the narrator and character, the emotions tend to be conveyed differently, either relying on the situation and character actions/reactions to imply the feeling to the reader OR coming right out and telling (though the latter is less common now with a third person narrator; first person is different, and you can use this technique more frequently, imo). 

7. As for describing a sequence of events, others (Fifthview and Heliotrope) have given really concrete advice and pointers. My only thing to toss in would be to slow down. Really dig into what's happening. Play around with the narrative distance and character perception. 

These are just some exercises that have worked well for me. They're not prescriptive, and though I sound like I'm ordering you to do things, I'm not, I promise, and I'm sorry if it comes off that way. Good luck and happy writing.


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## Chessie2 (Oct 23, 2017)

Sometimes, it helps to go slow. The easiest way to learn how to describe things is by using the weather.

'It was a stormy night...(describe the storm) Winds, feel of the wind on the character's skin, is it cold? Warm? Rain? Flooding? 

It's about using your imagination and the more you practice writing the easier the descriptions will become.


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## Penpilot (Oct 23, 2017)

FifthView said a lot of what I wanted to say, but I will add what helped me most in understanding how to describe things was understanding the part POV plays in it. How things are described depends on what POV character the scene is being told from. No two characters will describe things in the same way.

For example, a character walks into a tavern. If that character is a thief, they may describe all the patrons as marks, and take note of all the pretty, shiny, and vulnerable valuables everyone is wearing.

If that character is cobbler, they may describe each patron by the type of shoes they're wearing and how the shoe and the wear on them tells the story of who these people are and what they've done.


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## skip.knox (Oct 23, 2017)

Chessie2 has the key, imo:  slow down.

I totally get what you are saying. I suffer from the same problem. When I am writing the first draft, I'm just trying to get the action sequence down. Walk the character down the street. Move the army across the mountains. I'm completely preoccupied with this, then that, then that. I've done this so many times, I can catch myself at it, even on the first draft.

The only fix I've found is to slow down. If I'm really worried that I have a sequence whose details I'm afraid I'll forget, I'll make a quick outline--hardly more than a list, really--just enough so I'll remember that the orcs jump down from the trees, not from the side of the road, and one of the characters gets captured. Something like that. Many times, I don't need that.

However I approach it, I try to put myself into the scene as thoroughly as I can. Sights, sounds, smells, internal thoughts, taste or touch once in a while. These apply to the character, the other characters, the landscape or room, all of it. No, I don't try to describe everything, but I try to "look" at all of it for bits that enhance the mood of the moment (action, suspense, romance, whatever). I look not only from the POV character, but from multiple angles, like setting up multiple cameras to film a scene.

It can be really painful. I just want to get on to the next scene. I still "sketch" scenes more than I should, especially where there's a lot of dialog. I'll come back to it. And I do, but here's something worth considering. The me who comes back to it--later, tomorrow, next week, on the third editing pass--is not the same me as I am at the moment of first heat. Something is happening during the first draft that I can rarely capture again. I'm trying to school myself to let that heat suffuse not only the actions, the plot moments, but also descriptions. I'll still come back and edit, but when I'm able to slow down *during* the first draft, I find I conjure up turns of phrase that escape me when I'm in rewrite or edit mode. IOW, I believe slowing down, getting at least some description in on the first draft, is worthwhile, however difficult it proves to accomplish.


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## Malik (Oct 24, 2017)

weechlo said:


> All my stuff is "and then this happened, and then this. He did this. Blah blah blah, he said."



This was huge chunks of my first draft of this sequel. No joke. Three rewrites later, it's starting to feel like a book.

As for descriptions, my rule is to envision the scene, and then write what the observer -- narrator, POV character, whoever's eyes you're writing through -- would see first, then second, then next. Think about the time that it takes to notice those things, and then pace out the timing of the scene and figure out what the POV character would have time to notice between each bit of dialogue or action. (This is also where you introduce Chekhov's Gun if you need it.)  If two people are having a heated argument right in front of you, you're not going to take note of the steam rising from their teacups or a spot on one of their sleeves; at least, not if you're paying close enough attention to know exactly what they're saying. Just my $.02 and what works for me.


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## Chessie2 (Oct 24, 2017)

Malik said:


> This was huge chunks of my first draft of this sequel. No joke. Three rewrites later, it's starting to feel like a book.
> 
> As for descriptions, my rule is to envision the scene, and then write what the observer -- narrator, POV character, whoever's eyes you're writing through -- would see first, then second, then next. Think about the time that it takes to notice those things, and then pace out the timing of the scene and figure out what the POV character would have time to notice between each bit of dialogue or action. (This is also where you introduce Chekhov's Gun if you need it.)  If two people are having a heated argument right in front of you, you're not going to take note of the steam rising from their teacups or a spot on one of their sleeves; at least, not if you're paying close enough attention to know exactly what they're saying. Just my $.02 and what works for me.


Can I play devil's advocate for a moment here and say that slipping in omniscient while writing a book from 3rd is also a convenient way of describing things? Okay, okay...so we're not supposed to do such things, right? Mix povs. I can already feel the tomatoes hitting my body. But it's something I like to do when I want to give the reader a bit of space and room to breathe. Js.


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## Penpilot (Oct 24, 2017)

Chessie2 said:


> Can I play devil's advocate for a moment here and say that slipping in omniscient while writing a book from 3rd is also a convenient way of describing things? Okay, okay...so we're not supposed to do such things, right? Mix povs. I can already feel the tomatoes hitting my body. But it's something I like to do when I want to give the reader a bit of space and room to breathe. Js.



I think I heard Brandon Sanderson say he does a little of this. I think it was specific to the opening of a book or scene, but regardless, I think I've seen it pop up in a few books I've read. The only reason I probably noticed was because of being a writer. 

But otherwise, if it works for you, then it works for you. Know the rules, break the rules sort of thing.


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## weechlo (Oct 24, 2017)

One writer, John Flanagan, shifts between character POV in the middle of scenes. Either that or it's the weirdest omniscient POV I've ever seen.

Love him but it's the weirdest thing.


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## FifthView (Oct 24, 2017)

weechlo said:


> One writer, John Flanagan, shifts between character POV in the middle of scenes. Either that or it's the weirdest omniscient POV I've ever seen.
> 
> Love him but it's the weirdest thing.


 

It's head-hopping third omniscient.


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## Chessie2 (Oct 24, 2017)

Penpilot said:


> I think I heard Brandon Sanderson say he does a little of this. I think it was specific to the opening of a book or scene, but regardless, I think I've seen it pop up in a few books I've read. The only reason I probably noticed was because of being a writer.
> 
> But otherwise, if it works for you, then it works for you. Know the rules, break the rules sort of thing.


Yeah I agree it's only something I've noticed from writing as well. To be honest, it's not something I use frequently either. I actually just wrote a paragraph in omniscient just recently for my WIP during a transition scene where the hero is overlooking a valley. Then I brought in the heroine through that transition. I could have used his pov but it felt right doing it the other way.


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## TheCrystallineEntity (Oct 24, 2017)

I'm very good at both description and imagery--perhaps a bit too much. If you can imagine events in the story happening as if filmed for a movie, that might help. [At least, that's how it is for me.]


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## Malik (Oct 25, 2017)

weechlo said:


> One writer, John Flanagan, shifts between character POV in the middle of scenes. Either that or it's the weirdest omniscient POV I've ever seen.
> 
> Love him but it's the weirdest thing.



"Head hopping" isn't a problem as long as the author has a solid grasp on voice. Read through _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ or _The Princess Bride_, and you'll see that some scenes change viewpoint character in the middle of a paragraph, or even for just one line. Once you have your characters' voices and perceptions dialed in and clearly different from each other, it's a wonderful technique. There's a lot of misunderstanding about omniscient third, though, and since it takes most authors literally years if not a lifetime to develop awareness of voice to the point where they can shift voice seamlessly, most new authors don't use omniscient, or they try it and botch it. Botching it is when you get "head-hopping." (I also think that many fledgling authors don't understand the difference between POV and voice, but that's another issue entirely.)


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## Chessie2 (Oct 25, 2017)

I think we discussed this ages ago but if I recall correctly, POV=closer to the character and voice=further away from the character.


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## FifthView (Oct 25, 2017)

Malik said:


> "Head hopping" isn't a problem as long as the author has a solid grasp on voice. Read through _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ or _The Princess Bride_, and you'll see that some scenes change viewpoint character in the middle of a paragraph, or even for just one line. Once you have your characters' voices and perceptions dialed in and clearly different from each other, it's a wonderful technique. There's a lot of misunderstanding about omniscient third, though, and since it takes most authors literally years if not a lifetime to develop awareness of voice to the point where they can shift voice seamlessly, most new authors don't use omniscient, or they try it and botch it. Botching it is when you get "head-hopping." (I also think that many fledgling authors don't understand the difference between POV and voice, but that's another issue entirely.)



The term "head-hopping" does seem to be used negatively more often that neutrally, to describe the botched attempts—often, from a perspective that favors limited third, or to describe breaking POV in limited third.

I tend to use it neutrally to describe a particular type or approach to omniscient, to distinguish that type of omniscient from others, taking my cue from this episode of Writing Excuses: http://www.writingexcuses.com/2012/03/18/writing-excuses-7-12-writing-the-omniscient-viewpoint/


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## Heliotrope (Oct 25, 2017)

Yeah, I  don't get the negative feelings toward head hopping either. Did no one read Dune? Narnia? 

Re: Voice, yeah, I remember that debate lol!


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## weechlo (Oct 25, 2017)

Heliotrope said:


> Yeah, I  don't get the negative feelings toward head hopping either. Did no one read Dune? Narnia?
> 
> Re: Voice, yeah, I remember that debate lol!


I have nothing against it, it was just very strange because Ranger's Apprentice (the book series written by John Flanagan that used it) did it very... Shamelessly isn't the right word... But it was like, "Horace said this. He thought this that and the other. Will laughed. Will thought that Horace was blah blah blah. Halt thought this and remembered that." Like. It was in the same paragraphs that the POV would just hop around and it was like "Whoa, that's _allowed?_"

Learn something new every day.


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## skip.knox (Oct 25, 2017)

weechlo, yep. That's omniscient. Used to be more common than in modern writing. I'm fine with any approach so long as it's done well. The main place where it will be a stumbling block is when submitting to agents. They are less likely to favor a book with omniscient POV, unless the writing has other distinct merits.


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## Malik (Oct 26, 2017)

weechlo said:


> "Whoa, that's _allowed?_"



Absolutely allowed. Just really, really hard to do well. Again, it comes down to having a grasp on voice, and voice takes most authors years if not decades to dial in. 

I write in omniscient, which means that voice is everything -- as it should be -- but in omniscient, I need each character, and my narrator, to have separate enough voices that the reader can tell who's speaking or thinking at any given time. This is one reason it takes so long for me to punch out a book. I have a blog post on voice vs. POV here.

Excerpt:

"Character voices are the hardest thing about fiction writing. It’s where you spend the most time fiddling. Voice is where you spend fifteen minutes taking out a comma, or two hours tweaking a phrase. Voice is where you really have to dig into your advanced writing techniques. Voice is hard because when it’s done right, the reader doesn’t notice it. Voice is thankless; invisible. Voice is a Japanese garden, grown and shaped one leaf and limb at a time over years until it looks effortless and natural; it’s mimicry of the real world through the lens of the ideal.

"Close third becomes a wad of wet cardboard when every character speaks with the same voice, and lack of distinct character voices is one of the first sure signs (outside of poor mechanics and spelling) that an author doesn’t have the chops, yet. If you’re writing close third, every scene that’s framed through a different character should have a feel distinct to that character. It should read differently. Different things should matter to the character. The reader should see things that the other characters in the scene don’t, and vice versa. It’s hard.

"What makes omniscient third even harder, though, is that you have to build an additional character who is also not you, and determine their voice, and then you need to use that voice to tell the story. That voice — the narrator — is a filter, a lens, for the voices of the other characters. The narrator is framed in omniscient third, and it becomes its own character on top of it. The narrator knows what the characters know. What he decides to tell you is part of his character voice, and this is where you get into storytelling. What you reveal through your narrator is what makes the story funny, or scary, or sad. Think of your omniscient third narrator as someone sitting in your living room with a drink in his hand, telling you a story. If he just tells you what he saw, it’s not nearly as good as if he had spoken with the people involved and knew what was going through their minds.

"Picture the storyteller on your sofa again. Now, think of how much better any story gets when the person telling it does good impressions. Those impressions are your voice shifts. That’s your 'head hopping.' It’s your character voices filtering through your narrator’s voice. That’s what you’re shooting for with omniscient third. And it’s really, really hard. It takes a long time."

"Reading a work with no distinct character voices is like listening to someone tell a long story while sucking at impressions."​


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## Chessie2 (Oct 26, 2017)

It's like acting out voices in your head. 

Just wanted to add real quick that narrating in omniscient takes skill that you'll only learn by actually trying. Nothing irritates me more than when I hear: "Oh, but NEW writers shouldn't do it because they suck at it!"

Okay...last I checked, learning new skill takes actual practice. SO please don't let the naysayers say you're not good enough yet to do it. Otherwise how the heck will you learn?!?!?!?!?!!!!!

A final point: omniscient takes knowing what tone and voice that particular book needs. I've only written one of my romances in omniscient because most romance readers prefer 3rd so whatever. What's interesting is that title has gotten the best reviews and sells the best out of all my titles. It's in a niche though: ww2 romance. The entire time I wrote it, I thought of the old movies like Laura and other noir films (of which I've watched entirely too many). All this to say that I knew what kind of voice needed to go into that book. It was a sophisticated storyteller voice because the characters are high class. The heroine is very feminine and fussy while the hero is suave but a bit naive (he's much younger than her). So in a lot of his dialogue he sounds desperate to understand her, and I played on this when I zoomed away from his dialogue to narrate those scenes. Also, his ex girlfriend makes a huge appearance in the book and her voice was very sultry yet vindictive. The child (the heroine's daughter) has a few scenes and I got to narrate her as a bratty girl acting out because her daddy was dead and she wanted attention. Anyway, you must know your characters because you can cater to their voices when you zoom out and narrate. Either way, the author's voice remains strong while being distinctive between all the other voices (in your head ha).

Writing in omniscient is hella fun.


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## Malik (Oct 26, 2017)

Chessie2 said:


> Just wanted to add real quick that narrating in omniscient takes skill that you'll only learn by actually trying. Nothing irritates me more than when I hear: "Oh, but NEW writers shouldn't do it because they suck at it!"
> 
> Okay...last I checked, learning new skill takes actual practice. SO please don't let the naysayers say you're not good enough yet to do it. Otherwise how the heck will you learn?!?!?!?!?!!!!!



Just to be clear, I'm not saying that new authors shouldn't attempt omniscient. I'm saying that new authors need to be aware of how much practice it takes to write 500 pages in omniscient voice without people screaming at you about "head hopping." 

There's still this mindset among fledgling authors that writing a book constitutes enough writing to write a good book. It doesn't work that way. This whole endeavor -- not just writing in omniscient, but getting back to the OP's question about description and imagery -- takes a lifetime. Nobody likes to hear that, but it does. Craft comes with decades of tinkering, and exercises, and stalled projects, and books that never sold, and drafts that died on the vine. I believe that your first good book has a million words behind it; you only publish the last hundred thousand or so. 

The more you write, even if you don't publish, the better you'll get, and the easier things like the OP's description and imagery -- along with dialogue, humor, tension, voice, subtext, and a thousand other things that make up a "good" book -- will come to you, because you'll be practiced at creating them. You won't get any better until you put your butt in a chair and start writing something. And you have to be ready to be terrible at it for a long time, because you will never know enough. You'll still be learning how to write the day you die.


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## Demesnedenoir (Oct 26, 2017)

I wouldn’t call head hopping omniscient, I use head hopping for the unintended POV gaff. I also wouldn’t claim any POV is more difficult than another to write well, they just have different strengths and weaknesses that fit different stories and styles well.


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## skip.knox (Oct 26, 2017)

I agree with Malik. Maybe not a million words. Maybe only 900,000. But I want to add this: pretty much all writing counts. Not business reports or the like, but anything where you are trying to communicate with strangers to make a point that is yours. So I wouldn't count ad copy, for example. And I think some words count more than others; specifically, anything you write that gets critiqued by someone else counts for more than stuff you just write. I learned more from my two short stories that were critiqued by readers at the magazines than five times that much writing on my own. 

I also learned a great deal from my academic writing. Not how to tell a story, but how to construct sentences and paragraphs that hang together, and how to recognize when they don't. Most importantly, I learned how to take criticism. Years in grad school, followed by some academic publications. I learned to listen to the other person when they said change this or why did you do that. Invaluable.


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## Heliotrope (Oct 26, 2017)

Yeah, one of my favourite Canadian authors Anne Marie McDonald said of her first novel that she wrote the same novel ten times before she ended up with the published cut we read. She said for sure it was close to a million words. 

I agree with Skip too about academic writing. My degrees are English Lit and History, and that was a loooooooot of papers to write. It didn't help so much with characterization and plot development (though I was theorizing on these issues in my lit papers). But the benefit of having to argue my own point in a direct and cohesive way was invaluable.


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## weechlo (Oct 26, 2017)

Heliotrope said:


> Yeah, one of my favourite Canadian authors Anne Marie McDonald said of her first novel that she wrote the same novel ten times before she ended up with the published cut we read. She said for sure it was close to a million words.
> 
> I agree with Skip too about academic writing. My degrees are English Lit and History, and that was a loooooooot of papers to write. It didn't help so much with characterization and plot development (though I was theorizing on these issues in my lit papers). But the benefit of having to argue my own point in a direct and cohesive way was invaluable.


Oh definitely. When I was in high school, I not only journaled extensively, I also did a lot of... online debating, shall we say. Word choice, idea structure... it's not just for fiction.


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## Malik (Oct 26, 2017)

I write and lecture for a living. My editor (at the office, not my novel editor) is tough, and  our standards and regulations are strict. I think it's critical to every author's development to have at least one professional writing gig in your life where you want to hit your editor with a brick roughly once a week.


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## Chessie2 (Oct 27, 2017)

Heliotrope said:


> Yeah, one of my favourite Canadian authors Anne Marie McDonald said of her first novel that she wrote the same novel ten times before she ended up with the published cut we read. She said for sure it was close to a million words.
> 
> I agree with Skip too about academic writing. My degrees are English Lit and History, and that was a loooooooot of papers to write. It didn't help so much with characterization and plot development (though I was theorizing on these issues in my lit papers). But the benefit of having to argue my own point in a direct and cohesive way was invaluable.


Heh. Mine were scientific papers with graphs. Didn't do shit for learning how to write anything engaging, that's for sure.


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## Lexi_Banner (Nov 6, 2017)

First off - take it easy on yourself for the first draft.  So long as you get the words on the page, they can be made better.  

I find it hard to smoothly lay in description.  I loathe stories that drag over the details of how a character looks down to the last thread on their socks.  The problem is that I tend to go too far in the other direction and wind up leaving the reader completely lost in a world with nothing to anchor them in my story.

So what I do is layer it in during my edits.  I force myself to describe every room they enter, even if it's only a sentence.  I do the same for characters - at least once a chapter, they get a minor descriptor.  Sometimes it's as simple as mentioning his green eyes, or her kickass leather jacket.  Just enough to ground the reader in the reality I've created.

Hopefully that gives you some idea of how to find places to layer in details of the story.


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## Devor (Nov 6, 2017)

Ohh gosh.  Where to begin.

*1)  Use Good Verbs.*  Not nouns, not adjectives, not POV - *the visuals are all in the verbs.*  Compare these two sentences:

_The German Shepherd's fur had a black coat and a golden underbelly._

_Golden fur spread across the German Shepherd's underbelly, breaking up its black coat._

Spread? Breaking? Really, those words in this context are so vague they shouldn't add anything, and yet just by being verbs they make all the difference.

*2) Power comes from detail.* People have mentioned this, but they haven't gone far enough. *Power comes from detail that implies the context of the scene*. 

_The red apple had a short stem and a bite in it. There was a bruise on one side and dirt in the lower part of the bite mark. It sat on the table._

^ Nobody cares that the apple is red or that the stem was short. The bite implies something, but what? The bruise and the dirt imply that it was dropped. The location of the dirt in the bite doesn't matter at all. And a table?  Okay.

Three details matter here:  The bruise. The bite. The table. *These details imply parts of the bigger scene.* Just mentioning those details, and cutting the others, makes the passage stronger..

_The apple had a bite in it and a bruise on one side. It sat on the table._

There's something funny happening here. The other details, the ones that were cut, are easier to fill in with your imagination than for the reader to try and copy and absorb the details that used to be there. It's true, maybe now some people are seeing a greenish red apple, or don't see the bite mark as a little dirty, or that the stem is short. But the overall image is more clear, and easier to generate, without those details.

It is absolutely true that there are times where you can go on and on with the detail, setting the scene, and implying the attitude around that setting. But every detail you mention needs to hit that mood.  Or with a character description, if you're implying that character's personality, every detail needs to touch that personality.
*
3) Use detail according to your skill level.* A good story can do well with a basic, bare-boned writing style that anyone can learn. You can forget the detail and nice touches.

*It's enough to just be clear with your writing.
*
If detail is difficult, on the one hand, absolutely, try some exercises - sit down and describe a fisherman's hut inside and out - and get better.  No matter what you're writing, it's one of those skills you should work on and improve.  But don't force yourself into a writing style that doesn't fit you.  You don't have to dribble every page with detail if you're not good at it. Find the moments where it's necessary - there's always some - do your best.... and get an editor.


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## Rkcapps (Nov 6, 2017)

There isn't much to add, everyone has it covered. Brilliantly. I would, however, echo the sentiment "take it easy on yourself in a first draft". Slowing down is key to getting it right but if you're participating in NaNoWriMo, wait to slow down in December. Wait until then to go back and fix things. Sounds like you're working on the first draft of something. Just get the story out. Get something on paper you can go back and fix things after.

I must say, I really relate to the comma comment. I agonise over the placement of them because my inner grammar voice says, "that's wrong " but my character says, "I don't speak that way!"


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## skip.knox (Nov 6, 2017)

And if there's a bite in the table, now we're talkin'.


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## Michael K. Eidson (Nov 8, 2017)

Lexi_Banner said:


> So what I do is layer it in during my edits. I force myself to describe every room they enter, even if it's only a sentence. I do the same for characters - at least once a chapter, they get a minor descriptor. Sometimes it's as simple as mentioning his green eyes, or her kickass leather jacket. Just enough to ground the reader in the reality I've created.



This is what I'm doing now in editing my WIP, laying in the descriptions that I left out while writing the first draft. I'm terrible at putting in description as I go. I'm so focused on what's happening, what's being said, who's involved, and how they are feeling about it all, and getting that on the page. I have a mental picture of the scene setting in my head, but that doesn't often get onto the page in the first draft. The mental images have stayed with me, so I'm making sure they get onto the page now that I'm making an editing pass over the manuscript.

Anyone who is participating in NaNoWriMo is forgiven for anything one might consider as bad writing. The goal is to get 50K words on the page. Doesn't matter if you have description or dialogue or voice or character arcs or plot or anything else. Just get words on the page. Worry about making sense of the story, if there is sense to be had, in December.


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## FifthView (Nov 8, 2017)

Michael K. Eidson said:


> Anyone who is participating in NaNoWriMo is forgiven for anything one might consider as bad writing. The goal is to get 50K words on the page. Doesn't matter if you have description or dialogue or voice or character arcs or plot or anything else. Just get words on the page. Worry about making sense of the story, if there is sense to be had, in December.



My experience of Nano:

I'm putting in lots of description as I go along, and this is one of the things slowing me down. I like that description. I like trying to use motivation-reaction units as I go along, so something objective that leads to a reaction of some sort (including action) from one of the actors in the scene. Sometimes the reaction is not so direct as in "There's a shuttered window. Darkness sucks. 'Man I hate the dark..' He walks to the window and throws open the shutters."  [Heh, not an actual string of sentences I would use.] Sometimes there's a more tonal thing I do, so that the description builds a tone and then a character's thoughts will be of the same tone, but the two aren't directly related, one leading to another.

Anyway. This slows me down when I begin to realize, after exhaustion has set in for the X day in a row, that the description is becoming clunky, repetitive, mechanical. Then I'm like, crap, I need to think about the details of this place/thing/person more. And I can grind to a virtual halt.

OTOH, voices talking in a white room can also begin to feel meaningless to me, if that's all there ever is. They are context-less, maybe on the nose, dunno. I like my MRUs.

Ultimately I'm in the same boat. I have to move on and worry about fixing/fine-tuning the description later, to get the most efficient and effective MRUs.


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## Heliotrope (Nov 8, 2017)

Yep. Same boat here. Repetitive descriptions. I find I use favourite words all the time. I also find I tend to gravitate towards smells for some reason? I don't know? Maybe I'm super sensitive to smells. I have to remind myself to describe more than just smells lol.

But yeah, when writing a draft I simply focus on Scene/sequal and MRU's like FifthView mentioned, then I go back waaaaaaaaay later and add in descriptive detail. But this is normal for me. Drafts come in layers. Usually the first draft is lots of telling and showing thoughts and emotions, often time in the form of pages and pages of nothing but dialogue. Then the next layer is rearranging it so it has some decent structure. The next layer is considering the differences in each character present and making sure they are coming off as distinct (re-writing dialogue, describing actions, etc), then I'll do another layer about setting... it's a process for me. It takes a lot of tries.


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## Steerpike (Nov 8, 2017)

Heliotrope said:


> Yeah, I  don't get the negative feelings toward head hopping either. Did no one read Dune? Narnia?



Head-hopping is fine, so long as it is done well. I think much of the negative connotation around it comes from so many beginning authors who stumble into it inadvertently, or if they do realize what they're doing they just do it badly. You can find skilled writers who head-hop within paragraphs or even sentences (see Virginia Woolf), but most POV changes I've seen in genre fiction come at a chapter or section break.


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