Every author, published or not, will agree that practice is essential to writing good fiction. Recently Fantasy Faction posted an article about improving descriptions in writing. It seems to be a practice where many writers need improvement.
I believe I am in that group as well. When I went through my rough draft of Awakening to War, I found many new scenes opened with little or no description of the surroundings. In some cases, that is fine, such as when I am opening in a location already described earlier, in which case I may just write that they are there, and move on into the scene. Others, though, needed work. I’ve edited the book 3 times, and it is currently being read by some beta readers, but for now, my assumption is I will need to revisit it again in the future.
I have heard many tips provided about how to improve, one among them being to describe the room you are in, as you writing. You could practice a brief 1 paragraph description, or a longer “hero” description of the room. I have posted mine below, and I warn you, it is a mess of a room, filled wall to wall with stuff. I hope that you can get a real sense of the room from the description, to feel as if you are there. Feel free to post your own practice description in the comments of this thread. Additionally, if you have any other practice exercises, you may post those as well.
The whir of a large fan filled the small rectangular room; movie and game posters, along with a few framed autographed photos wrapped around its walls. A desk at one wall held a computer, inkjet printer and speakers, littered with bottles of paint, paper sheets, and small hand tools. Next to it, tucked into the corner, a tall organizer held more model building tools and supplies, along with a box sitting on its top overflowing with still more supplies. Next to the desk was a second printer, a large Xerox laser printer, resting on a cart full of copy paper, toner supplies, glossy paper and card stock.
On either side of the room were two shelving units, one made of thick black wire and containing cardboard pads, plastic bags and other production supplies. The second, next to the office door, was cast in a gray plastic, containing two more printers, more paint and supplies, scale model vehicle kits, and even a stack of comics on its shelves.
Under the window, opposite the door, a square black folding table stood bearing the weight of a mid-sized paint booth, which was switched on and filling the room with the white noise of the motor and rushing air. Next to the table was a second folding table, also black, but narrow and long, its surface empty. Nearby, a closet spilled its contents out in an alluvial fan model kits, supplies, boxes of electronic and junk the owner couldn’t bear to throw away, topped with a very large plastic bag full of packing peanuts.
It was a room that was used both for hobby and for business. It was the home office.
Photo taken while waiting in line for the traveling Star Wars Exhibit in Seattle, WA. Yep, I'm a total nerd. I love Star Wars, Star Trek, and Battlestar Galatica. #nerd tag explodes.
One Comment
I’ve wrestled with descriptions in my own writing recently. How much is sufficient? How much is too much?
What has helped me tremendously is to channel the description words I actually type through the POV character’s eyes. Orson Scott Card in his book, Character and Viewpoint, is a big proponent of this method as is Evan Marshall in his book, The Marshall Plan for Novel Writing.
What this means is that the only description you should write is what your viewpoint character senses, knows, perceives, or remembers about the setting.
In your description exercise, how would you really describe this office if you were a character in a story. This is your office, you spend time there and know its entire layout and contents. But in a story, would you really look at and visually inventory every item in the room? No. You’d enter the office and sit down at the desk, and work, ignoring all the contents of the room that you weren’t immediately focused on. Unless something had changed or was missing or new, you as a character wouldn’t notice. With POV writing, you would only note important or remarkable details. This type of focused description helps the reader get into the character’s head and really see the world, even familiar places, through the character’s eyes.
I think a better exercise in description writing is to take any location, but write the description from the POV of two different characters. If we stick with an office, use the room owner AND a visitor who had never been there or hasn’t been there in awhile. As noted above, the room owner will ignore most of the room’s features because it is already familiar to him. So, the room owner would describe far less of the room and its contents and perhaps only his perception of the room as a whole, or how it makes him feel. Thus his perspective shapes the impression of his office and that conveys more weight to the reader. If he really felt peace and productivity in the office, the reader will sense that by what the room owner notices (.e.g. the room is comfortably warm, despite the snows pelting the windows). If the room owner feels stress in the room, then his perceptions would be colored by those feelings and he might key in on certain details (i.e. the huge pile of paperwork in the IN BOX or the unfinished PowerPoint presentation on the computer screen).
The second half of the exercise would be to describe the room the way the room owner’s estranged girlfriend would see it. Perhaps she’s coming over to pickup an iPod or Kindle reader she left behind. What will she “see” or “perceive” of the room? Will she have negative memories or associations? Will she be harsh and critical in her mind, focusing her gaze and thoughts on objects in the room that bother her? Is the temp of the room noticeable to her? Is the fan loud because the bearings are old and she doesn’t know how he can stand the noise? Is the room highly organized and she doesn’t understand how he can be so put together in his office, but so forgetful and disorganized in their relationship? Certain things will be important to her and the rest will not be. But these may very well be different things from the room owner.
In each case, a different character would describe things differently, the way witnesses to a traffic accident all describe the same scene differently. The witnesses notice and remember different details. I think the characters we write are like that too.
I don’t think we can afford to ever write straight narrative description in our stories anymore. We should write POV focused description, where less is more. We describe the highlights or overall details of a room, valley, river, castle tower, or boardroom and let the reader’s imagination fill in the rest. The details we do include should be only what the POV character would sense or notice. Everything else should be left out. This should give the reader more information with less words and a better sense of the character as well.
Also, I always try to use all five senses when describing new places to the reader. In real life, we are sight dominant, but hearing, touch, feeling, and smell are all a close second. Often we hear or smell things before we see them. We also feel things we cannot see, like the wind, or temp changes.
The five sense are especially important when describing a setting that in a fantasy or science fiction setting, since the reader will not always have a frame of reference from the real modern world.
Long comment, I know, but you brought up a good topic.