Be Precise (Not Merely Concise)

While concise writing can be a useful skill, precision is more interesting to readers.

This email is an excerpt of the Be Precise Workshop, a benefit of being in the StoryADay Superstars group. Interested? ​Find out more​.

Sometimes when I talk about precision in writing, people worry that I want them to write in a formal, clinical, or clipped fashion. Not so!

If you want readers to be interested in your characters, you need to bring them alive. One way to do that, is to use exquisitely targeted facts about them, including showing us what they notice.

The Things They Carry

The details that characters notice and obsess about are specific to them and their experiences.

Here’s an example, in which a young research associate observes his colleagues. As you read, notice: What do we discover about how Daffyd feels about each of them, from the details he notes?

Tonner Freis—with his tight smile and his prematurely gray hair that rose like smoke from an overheated brain—was, for the moment, the most celebrated mind in the world.

“From where Daffyd stood, the distance and the angle made it impossible to see Tonner’s face clearly. Or the woman in the emerald-green dress at his side. Else Annalise Yannin, who had given up her own research team to join Tonner’s project. Who had one dimple in her left cheek when she smiled and two on her right. Who tapped out complex rhythms with her feet when she was thinking, like she occupied her body by dancing in place while her mind wandered.

-James S. A. Corey, The Mercy of Gods (The Captive’s War Book 1), Orbit 2024

Here are some exercises to keep you company this weekend, and to help you sharpen your powers of observation in writing:

  1. How does Daffyd feel about Tonner?
  2. How does Daffyd feel about Elise?
  3. If he were to approach them, what might he be feeling?
  4. Write down five precise details that give you a sense of each person and how Daffyd feels about them.
  5. Go into a passage of your own writing and try to replicate this idea: which details does your character notice about other people (or the setting), and what is it about your character that makes them choose those detail to notice?
  6. Have you used the most precise language you can, to highlight those details?

What did you discover? Join the discussion

Why You Should Include Holidays In Your Stories

September.

That was when I saw the first ‘holiday’ themed products in my supermarket (and yes, I mean the twinkling-lights, snow-covered, jolly fat-man type holiday),

And I know I’ll start seeing Valentine’s displays soon.

As a consumer it drives me a little crazy.

As a writer, it’s a great reminder.

  • Holidays are part of the fabric of our lives
  • It pays to plan ahead if you’re creating something with a date-related theme!

Why Include Holidays?

Take the Holiday Stories Workshop

Write a holiday story, anytime, with this on-demand workshop.

When it comes to end-of-year holidays my personal bias is towards Christmas & New Year, but there are so many other holidays to celebrate. Which will you choose?

The great things about including a holiday in a story are:

  • They are evergreen: you can recycle them every year! (Think about how rich Maria Carey has become from that one song…)
  • They are universal: no matter what culture we come from we all have those days where people come together, eat too much, face family members and friends they don’t really want to see, see people they haven’t seen for years, have fights, make up, fall in love, and get nostalgic.
  • It’s an instant character-motivation-creator: around a holiday you always have some people who are sad, some people are excited, and some people who are a little too into it…
  • If you are writing in a secondary or fantasy world, including this universal human experience in your story enriches the culture you’re creating. It feels real when your characters’ lives are complicated by ritual events they may have strong feelings about (even if it’s just to be frustrated at the interruption to their quest!)

Instant Drama

One of the best ways to get to know people is to see how they act under stress.

One of the best ways to stress your characters and find out who they are, is to throw them into the mix with people they wouldn’t necessarily choose to be with.

Can you think of a better way to do that, than to send them a holiday party? 😉

What holiday will you include in your next story? Is it real or fictional? What is your favorite holiday? Leave a comment!

Craft In the Real World, an Interview with Matthew Salesses

Episode 1999 - Craft in the Real World with Matthew Salesses

Matthew Salesses is the author of three novels — one written in Flash Fiction — and the writing handbook “Craft In The Real World”. In this episode we talk about writing rules, audience, how to give and receive feedback and what it was like to write a flash fiction novel.

Photo credit: Grace Salesses

Ready to write today, not “some day”?

Let’s Talk About Flash Fiction

In which I encourage you to write Flash Fiction and tell you about an upcoming online workshop.

Flash Fiction chat, April 10, 2017

Posted by Story A Day on Tuesday, April 11, 2017

The online workshop will happen on April 22, 2017 from 4 PM until late.

There are 10 tickets for full workshop participants (writing exercise, critique and discussion) and 40 reduced-price tickets for audience-only attendees.

Sign up now