You’ve heard it over and over: Show, don’t tell. Well, I agree with that sentiment when it comes to important emotional scenes. Fiction, nonfiction, doesn’t matter. If you want to stir your readers, learn to show powerful emotions.
As I thought about this blog, though, I figured you all don’t need yet another how to. Instead, I want to challenge you to share the most powerful emotion you felt this week. And see if we can tell what the emotion is.
Ground rules?
- No naming emotions. You have to give us the sense of your emotion without saying what it is.
- You have to do it in no more than five lines. Seriously, no more.
- If you share, be sure to comment on the others’ offerings to let them know what emotion you got from what they wrote.
Okay? I’ll start.
He was back! Sun glinting on his red crown, wings battering the air with fierce determination as he zipped this way and that, performing daredevil aerial maneuvers to protect his feeder from intruders. She leaned back in her chair, not even trying to stop her grin. Oh! How she loved watching hummingbirds.
Your turn!
[Photo by Karen Ball]
What’s Your Third Book?
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Great job, everyone! Thanks for participating!
From my WIP. Perfect topic today as I try to convey all kinds of emotion in this scene:
His words reached through the page straight to my heart.
Then it struck me… he thought I was with Warren!
“He doesn’t know,” I whispered.
Like those old-timey slides my grandma used to show me from when she was a girl, they had to be lined up just-so to work properly, the pieces of my conversation with Brody at the airport lined up and clicked together.
I looked at his words again, and couldn’t help the goofy grin that slid across my face. I whispered, “He still loves me.”
Realization, then happiness.
On Kate’s: longing and hope.
She snuggled deeper into the plaid blanket and turned the page. A slow, scratching sound made her look towards the window beside her. Silence. She turned another page. The lights flickered and cold air rushed across her body.
Fear, startled
I could see that hummingbird, Karen! I got wonder at the glory of creation.
Here’s mine (and it’s a true story!):
As they brought the metal mesh barrel filled with scraps of pink paper on stage, I leaned over to my husband and said, “Wouldn’t you just die if one of us won?” Two tickets to The Met in New York City with airfare and hotel included–total bucket list stuff. The auditorium went silent as the orchestra conductor pulled a name from the barrel, “Becca With-am.” I looked at the conductor, at my husband, and back at the conductor who almost pronounced my last name correctly…I mean, it was pretty close. So close that, “Are you KIDDING me?”
Oops…five lines, not five sentences. Sorry! 🙂
Did the same thing!
LOL! You writers. You never READ! xo
Thanks, Becca. Yours is full of fun and delight. How was the trip?
It hasn’t happened yet…probably in October or November.
My voice carried my smile to the front door after it opened, then closed. “Good evening.” Silence.
She came into the kitchen, opened a blank notebook, and wrote, “I’m feeling three levels at the same time.”
“What are you talking about? Are you sick?”
“NO,” she wrote, practically gouging out the paper with her pen.
“I think I need to call 911.”
“No! Don’t!”
Confusion. And concern.
“Tch.”. He gritted his teeth. “So that’s it then, after everything you’ve done, you’re just going to leave?!”
She met his eyes steadily, though something in her gaze said she was disinterested in his words. “I don’t expect you to suddenly understand everything you do to drive me away. I’m tired of fighting about it for hours on end and getting nowhere, all you need to know is I’m going and nothing will change that.”
Becca: Surprise, then glee.
Barbara: extreme irritation
I flunked with my first, so here’s a second try.
“I should guard you until your father returns.” He shook his head once. “I might not be able to.”
“Yes, you can. We’ll be at the farm soon, and we’ll be safe there. After you heal, you’ll protect me again.”
His ears caught the quaver in her voice. He took a deep breath and blew it out through pursed lips. Even in the darkened room, everything looked . . . sparkly. God, is this what it feels like to be dying?
Ooo, very nice! Well done.
It’s hard to beat the succinct sentiment expressed in Roger Miller’s 1964 Grammy Award-winning song: “Well, dang me! Dang me! They ought to take a rope and hang me—high from the highest tree! Woman, would you weep for me?”
Joy permeates her office and I laugh being around her. Yesterday we worked, did good things, made music and sang together. Love for her marriage was on her mind and I share my own. Tonight hearts weep. She is widowed, alone. I hug my husband tighter as we share our love and wonder how much time we have together…
Emphathy. Loss
He sat. The creaking of the old chair felt strangely familiar. Like he’d heard it many times before. But that was impossible. As impossible as the way it fit to him now, like a mother’s hand over his saying, “Come sweets, we’ll cross the street together.”
The guard strapped his legs down. Together. One. Two. Three. Cross.
What an interesting exercise! Love Bill Hendricks’s mention of the classic “Dang Me.” Roger Miller was a great country wordsmith…
To Karen’s comment of “showing, not telling, emotion,” which I agree with, I would add that sometimes underplaying emotion in a scene can be very powerful. Too many fledgling writers I see want to throw everything in, and the writing winds up being exhausting rather than gripping.
Holding you transports me. Your warm cheek, nestled in the crook of my arm. Your back occupying more of my lap each week. Your legs curled around me, or often, sticking straight up into my face, your tiny toes tickling my chin. Your smile is so easy, so beautiful. Your dark eyes hold all the truths of the universe. You are perfection.