Excruciating details -- Immersing readers in your novels, short stories, and other prose works

I think, except when you are writing instructions, the best writing is that which people want to read again and again. They often use the word “reexperience” or even “relive.” And, even though the relationships are built on ink marks on paper (or the virtual equivalent), prose can excite our senses more that a film.

A film has sound and pictures, but a book has those plus smell, touch (which is an array of senses), taste, and, I suspect, other less defined senses, as well.

I have a friend who sees every number as a distinct personality. Because of this, you can read him 1,000 numbers, and he can recite them back to you. I taste lemon when I hear that word. I have a whole-body resonance with places I know. Mention my college campus or my grandfather’s farm or my first grade classroom, and I get more than memories rushing back. I feel these places distinctly and intensely and emotionally.

Words on paper cue all of my senses, including the odd undefined ones, in ways films cannot. I do live in the moment of a book. And the limits of ink on paper supercharge my imagination.

How can you do this for readers? I think the primary requirement is that you live in the moment yourself. If your imagination is not engaged, mine won’t be either. I believe that checklists and rules about including all the senses cannot help writers create true experiences if they are used dispassionately. They only have any use at all if they catalyze the Technicolor, all-singing, all-dancing dream of the scene that is being written. If the right brain stays quiet, the writing will be flat even if it includes all the details.

Oh, by the way, you probably shouldn’t include all the details. If you describe everything, the readers cannot engage. They become spectators rather than participants. (You can explore this further if you want by checking out the work of Marshall McLuhan.) I once asked NYT Bestseller Kristan Higgins about describing a hero in a book, and she said it was sufficient to convey one distinctive feature – the blue of his eyes, the quirk of his smile, the way he strode across the ballfield. Present and repeat, and the reader will fall in love.

Imagine it all, select enough to put the reader into the scene (but no more), and animate the same details later on in the story, as required.

Choosing the best places to set the scenes can lead to wonder, excitement, and anticipation. I have an article, “Take Me to Monte Carlo,” that explores this. If you have a choice, put a scene in an open, interesting space over a cramped, drab space. (Though, you don’t have a choice if you want people to feel trapped. A police holding cell has its own value apart from wonder and excitement.)

… and don’t forget metaphor. Poetic techniques (all of them) can bring people into scenes in special ways, but they need to be done with great care. The best way to master them is by seeing how writers you admire use them. As I mentioned in my last post, I began my writing apprenticeship writing whole scenes of my stories in the styles of Tolkien, Poe, Harlan Ellison, Roger Zelazny, and Twain.  I still do this on occasion when I am looking for answers. You'll find that, even where scenes might have fit the plot with the details another writer chose, each makes his or her distinct choices. Those selections create an unmistakable coherence and a unity in their work. It's worth striving for that. In prose, your distinct choices can come together to create a fresh engaging style.