5 Pro Tips On Writing Description In Deep Point Of View

December 31, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson Leave a Comment

Woop! Let’s give 2019 a giant kick out the door and welcome in 2020 with a bang! Beginning January 1^st, I am launching 30 Days Of Deep POV on my Facebook page, where I’ll be creating a video a day based on my 30 most popular blog posts (including guest posts) on deep point of view (t. Don’t miss out! Join the fun on Facebook!

I am continuing the Deep POV FAQ series and today’s question is: how do I add more pertinent details without boring my readers?

I get asked this A LOT concerning writing in deep point of view. I’ve blogged about writing description here and here. Here and here. But it is hard to know what you should expand on or cut way back, so let’s get super practical right now. Because to you – ALL the details are important. So how do you know what to keep and what to get rid of?

How Much Does The Reader Need To Know NOW?

Some details are important for the reader to know – to understand the story, but resist the temptation to deliver all of it at once. Ask – how much does the reader need to know RIGHT NOW to understand what’s going on? My personal rule for backstory is to answer one question and leave the reader with two more. Drip. Drip. Drip. Same rule applies here with description. Scene by scene, drip-drip-drip, ask yourself what information the reader absolutely needs to know to understand what’s going on right now. Does the reader need to know the history of THAT coffee table RIGHT NOW, or does the reader just need to know that there’s an interesting coffee table that catches her eye because right now something is more important to the character?

It’s better to deliver information to the reader through dialogue than a narrative passage, it’s more fun to read and is less likely to slow the pace. Think of the Immortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare. Clary knows nothing about the shadow world, about shadowhunters, so she’s always asking questions and needing things explained to her. Her questions deliver the information the reader needs to know to understand the story, but Clary couldn’t possibly know all the questions to ask in Chapter One. She has to keep moving forward and ask questions as they come up, on a need-to-know basis. That’s the best way to think of it. Keep the story moving ahead always.

For Those Who Love Flowery, Flowing, Descriptive Passages…

If this is you, probably you find that you have to edit out big sections of narrative (and it feels a bit like you’re gutting the heart of the story). First, you can’t fix something that isn’t written, so a pat on the back for getting the words down. That’s the first big hurdle.

With deep point of view, every bit of information given to the reader is filtered through the point of view character – not you, the writer. The goal of deep point of view, remember, is for the writer to disappear and for the reader to feel like they’re IN the story with the character. Ask yourself, at the beginning of any scene, what’s your POV character’s motivation in this scene? Sounds like something an actor would ask, but it works here too. Because, whatever your POV character is zoned in on determines what they notice, ignore, explain away, take in but don’t linger over, etc.

I often use the example of a teenage boy home from school who’s hungry. (yes, this might be an example ripped straight from my own life). The boy won’t notice the new paint on the wall, that the furniture has been rearranged, that mom’s got a new haircut – nothing. (all true stories) What he will notice is that the dog is wet when it jumps on him. He’ll notice if there’s a smell in the house that hints at baking taking place. He will have catalogued everything in the fridge and know if something’s been added or removed (say, leftover pizza).

This filtering of details is super important in deep point of view. A character who’s eager to impress or please, might trip over themselves offering compliments or searching for something they think the other person is proud of. A guy who’s walked into the local coffee shop and sees his girl sitting with some other guy will notice different things than the friends who are standing right next to him. It’s not that those other things don’t exist, but the details are filtered through what’s important to that character right now.

Additionally, remember that the reader does 80% of the work of description. If I tell you that a female walks into a male co-worker’s office, shuts the blinds, slips out of her heels and pops open the top three buttons on her blouse – does it matter what colour the carpet is, or if the desk between them is mahogany or oak? Ask what would THAT character focus on, IN THAT MOMENT? That’s what the reader gets to know about. Cut everything else.

The Details Given Specificity Are Considered Important By Readers

One of the pitfalls of deep point of view is falling into what’s called writing on the nose. This is when every movement is described in a blow-by-blow account that doesn’t serve the story. This needless description frustrates readers because the story’s pace moves at a glacial speed. Remember, the more time you spend describing anything, the more importance the reader will assume it to have. Whether it’s an object on a table, the table itself, or even the walk to answer the door, if it’s important to the character in that moment it had better help move the story forward. Be ruthless about this.

Some writers love these sweeping all-encompassing descriptions of setting. The moon, the stars, the wind through the trees, the crickets, the blah blah blah. Keep in mind that these sections of description slow the pace of your story, so be strategic with them. If it’s true to the character to notice the colours of the setting sun and reminisce about some childhood memory, that’s fine, but be strategic with the pacing. In the middle of a chase scene is not the place for that kind of narrative. Also, drip-drip-drip. It’s hard to justify giving more than a couple lines to this kind of description. If it’s a paragraph, two paragraphs, half a page or more, be very objective about whether the reader needs all that information in that spot.

What is the norm for the genre you’re writing in? Some genres make more room for these types of descriptive passages than others.

Use Description To Show More About Your Characters

Yes, it’s good to be specific when possible because it helps the reader picture the scene better. However, one pitfall to watch out for is giving the character knowledge they don’t actually possess. I can open the hood of my vehicle and find where to add wiper fluid, where to check the oil and add oil… and that’s about it. I’m sure those parts have proper names but I don’t know them. You wouldn’t have to tell a reader your character is a mechanic if they can open the hood and actually name all the parts and know their function, or recognize a problem in a particular part by a sound.

I can walk into a garden (near where I live) and name many of the plants growing in any season. My husband notices flower colours. I couldn’t tell you one designer hand bag from another, but I know what expensive looks like.

Use this filter to give the reader information about your character. This is part of show don’t tell. If I’m reading about a character who can walk into a new-to-them garden and name many of the plants, I assume they know a lot about gardening. The writer wouldn’t have to tell me that. But if your character knows everything about everything, I can’t discern anything about their character.

Additionally, does this garden-loving character get upset that the Irises are planted too deep (and now won’t flower), or do they take a moment to recall the Latin name for the plant? These small details give insight into the character, but are just a drip, drip, drip of information. The reader may not catch every single hint, but they’ll catch enough to get to know your character. It’s just a phrase, not even a whole sentence, of this kind of description filtered through what’s important to the character, that really brings a character and a story to life for readers.

Ask Your Beta Readers

In the end, knowing what to keep and what to cut comes down to how well you’re communicating ideas that you feel are important/vital to the story you want to tell and the characters you’ve created. Take the time to interview your beta readers. Pick out a particular scene, ask them how it made them feel? What did they love? Where were they tempted to skim? Know what effect you were going for in that scene and blatantly ask if you pulled that off. Ask more than one beta reader.

This is the kind of feedback that will help you learn where to be clearer, where you can lean closer to what might feel like melodrama to you, or where to cut back because the point is being muddied or the passage skimmed because there’s too many details. Ask people who love your genre, but will be honest with you. Beta readers who are afraid to hurt your feelings are all that helpful, ultimately — not if you’re looking to improve your writing.

Are you a writer who writes very sparse on a first draft and has to edit in description, or are you a writer who loves to add description and has to later go back and edit much of it out? How do YOU decide what to keep?

Been told you should learn Deep Point Of View? Had an editor or critique partner tell you to “go deeper” with the emotions in your fiction? Looking for a community of writers seeking to create emotional connections with readers? Check out the Free Resource Hub and then join the Going Deeper With Emotions In Fiction Facebook group.

How To Write With Immediacy In Fiction

December 12, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 3 Comments

We’re continuing in our FAQ series on Deep POV. The question that came in was: How do you write with immediacy?

There are a few foundational rules with deep point of view and writing with immediacy and removing distance are two of them. If you don’t write with immediacy you add perceived distance between the reader and the story, which is exactly what deep pov tries to eliminate. As I considered this question, I realized that I haven’t written much about this here or in my book, so let’s break this down.

Simply put, immediacy is writing as though everything in the story is happening right now.

Is Past Or Present Tense More Immediate?

Some writers get hung up on writing in past or present tense when asked about immediacy. Are you writing He is… or He was…? With deep point of view, there isn’t a right or wrong answer here. You can write in deep pov with immediacy equally well in past or present tense.

Is First Or Third Person Better?

Again – wrong question. I see many blogs out there saying first person is more intimate than third person, but I disagree. Written equally well, a reader can immerse themselves just as well in a first or third person story. Some readers will have a preference, many writers have a preference, one or the other is more popular in some genres.

I would like to clarify that writing in first person doesn’t automatically make your writing deep point of view (or more immediate). I’ve written about first or third person here. This is a distraction in the discussion about writing with immediacy or deep point of view.

What Is Writing With Immediacy?

Writing with immediacy is capturing the story as the character moves through a scene. Think of it like strapping a GoPro to your point of view character (POVC).

If story is a car, omniscient POV puts the reader in the back seat away from the action. A limited POV puts the reader in the shotgun seat beside the driver. Deep point of view puts the reader in the POVC’s lap in the driver’s seat. They see/hear/know/learn/feel everything the POVC does, but that’s ALL they know. The entire story is filtered through the POVC as though they are living the story in real time. It’s a first-person shooter style of storytelling.

Avoid The Narrator Voice

The narrator voice slips in particularly if you’re more familiar with the omniscient point of view style (or, I’ve found this happens among writers who, as readers, detest feeling tension when reading themselves). This is a stylistic choice that makes sure the reader knows everything is OK before the conflict really heats up. I can’t give you a template or a list of words to do a search for. It all depends on the effect the phrase creates.

Some examples might be:

Later, he would realize this had all been a dream. (and then the dream sequence begins)
If only she’d known how Brad would react, she’d have kept her mouth shut. (and then she says the thing she later regrets saying)

This idea of hindsight or looking back before the event comes off as author intrusion in deep point of view and it adds distance. Now, this doesn’t mean your character can’t second guess themselves, but it’s expressed after they’ve done something. It can also work in a self-fulfilling prophecy sense. This is a bad idea or I’m going to regret this… and then they step into the hard thing as an act of courage or whatever. That’s different than this all-knowing narrator slipping into the story foretelling the future.

Writing in this way, especially in deep point of view, undercuts the tension for readers. By reassuring readers that the character will be safe no matter what’s about to happen, the reader is chucked into the backseat of the story car surrounded with bubble wrap.

Immediacy With Emotions

Writing emotions with immediacy is an often-overlooked aspect of writing in deep point of view. I wrote about the four layers of emotional storytelling here. We usually start with the first layer, the primary emotions. These are our instinctive emotional responses – the gut reaction, the spontaneous reaction, the survival instinct, etc. Often, these emotions are quick and visceral – meaning they have a physical component to them, not a thinking component.

You show this through physiological responses, physical reactions, etc. These are not emotions we think about before we decide if we’re feeling them or not. For example, we each feel fear uniquely. Show what fear feels like to that character. What terrifies one person, another won’t even pause over. Primary emotions require immediate action and prepare your body to act.

She scrolled through Facebook with her thumb. A shadow fell across the floor in front of her. A man punched the up button on the elevator and then stood nearly shoulder to shoulder with her. She inched away. What’s his deal? She looked up at his face, his hair parted with precision and the angles of his face sharp and chiseled.

He looked down on her and winked. Her belly clenched and she glanced around the lobby. Empty. She flicked her thumb and pulled up the emergency screen on her phone. Her thumb hesitated. He wore a nice suit, a real-leather-looking case in his hand that matched his shoes, and a gold watch. But the tightness in her belly spread up to her chest, cinching and squeezing. Her heart beat faster. The elevator dinged and she flinched. The doors slid open.

This is all primary emotions, right. Now, those emotions are going to force the character to do something, because this isn’t a comfortable feeling. She takes in a lot of information trying to decide if she’s safe or not. In deep point of view, we give the reader what evidence we have at hand and let them decide what emotion the character is feeling. This way, the reader knows WHY the character makes the decision they do. Make the reader lean in to understand, to engage with the emotions in the scene.

Primary emotions are immediate, raw, and unfiltered.

Perspective Is Determined Through Immediacy

In the example above, all of the information given to the reader is filtered through the character’s perspective. Her perspective is informed by what’s important to her RIGHT NOW.

There are some scenes where a character’s emotions dictate their plans for the future. Much of the time, what our characters take in, filter, judge, assess, etc. is put through a lens of what’s important to them right now. A teen boy can overlook quite a few things when he is hungry. All the sensory data intake is focused on finding food – smell, sight, past experience, taste, etc.

Think of the example above of the woman at the elevator, how would it change the character’s primary emotions if she’d been sexually assaulted previously? How would her thinking response change if she was on her way to work, to a job she couldn’t afford to lose, and she was a little late? How would her primary emotions react if she’d just read on her phone that the police were investigating a string of recent assaults in that neighborhood? Or she’d just had a friend who was assaulted?

Do you see how immediacy can shape a character’s perception of everything around them and shape their responses? It’s all interconnected.

Have a question about writing with immediacy? This is the third post in the deep POV FAQ series, have a question you’d like to see answered – post it below!

4 Exercises To “Go Deeper” With Deep Point Of View

September 22, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 3 Comments

Hearing “go deeper” from crit partners and editors? Here are my 4 favorite tricks for digging deeper emotionally into a scene.

Deep point of view is a powerful writing technique, but it’s a strategy and like any technique or strategy you need to know what effect you want to create so you understand where and when to break the rules. What you have to decide for yourself (once you know the “rules”) is where and when you’re going to employ or break those rules in any given scene to create a specific effect for readers. There does need to be consistency, but there’s a lot of flexibility here.

Deep point of view applied too rigidly causes writing on the nose, navel gazing, slow pacing, and other problems.

In my Method Acting for Writers Masterclass (and moreso in my Deep Dive Author Club Membership) I help point out places where the writer could “go deeper” with their writing. It’s been my observation that these writers instinctively know what the scene needed, but hold back because they fear being melodramatic or of baring too much of themselves emotionally. Step into the uncomfortable and messy bits!

My students are always asking me how I know where to take the writing deeper. Part of it is simply having some emotional distance from the story. It’s easier to pick it out in a story I haven’t written lol. That aside, here are some things I look for when critiquing student work to help them go deeper.

What does your character want RIGHT NOW?

This is easy to miss and can absolutely swing a scene from blah to bang! Identify what your character desperately needs in the scene you’re working on. What they want will prioritize and filter everything they see, what they think, and how they interpret the body language of others.

A teenage boy gets home from school at 4PM and hasn’t had lunch yet. He’ll blow into the house and not notice if the walls have been painted or if anyone else is home, his goal is to get to the fridge to see what he can eat. He’ll notice if there are grocery bags on the counter. His nose will be attuned to any cooking smells. He opens the fridge and immediately searches the space where he last saw a leftover slice of pizza.

A husband returns home to his wife after a late-night meetup with his lover. What his wife notices or takes in will be a reflection of her priorities, experiences, etc. If she’s neck-deep in work, maybe she’ll give him a kiss on the cheek and apologize that she’ll be up late again. She won’t notice the lipstick on his collar or the perfume on his shirt.

If she’s spent the day wrangling preschoolers and is exhausted and feeling frumpy, she might just sag with relief when he says he’s going for a shower and then bed after being out late because please-don’t-want-sex-tonight. She’ll overlook the red flags, maybe even justify or dismiss clues because she trusts him and her priority at that moment is some peace and quiet.

In either situation, she’s not stupid for missing the clues and it isn’t that she hasn’t registered or taken in the red flags, but her conclusions are filtered through her priorities. It’s human nature to miss what you’re not looking for. If she was suspicious, or less distracted, or angry that he was late, she’d put more importance on or be more attuned to his body language or behavior.

Identify what your character wants in any scene and filter all the details they notice, even the words they use to describe what they notice, through that focus or priority.

Create An Emotional Arc With Every Scene

Identify the emotion your character feels at the beginning of a scene. Each scene has an emotional beginning, middle and end. With plot, you want to structure your scenes in such a way that the character begins with a goal (that is the next step to solving their story goal) and by the end of the scene either they’ve gotten what they wanted but no longer want it, or they fail to get what they want. The emotional arc works the same way. The failure in the scene should be reflected in the emotional arc for the character as well.

Each failure should have an emotional consequence.

This arc doesn’t need to be dramatic or life-altering. It’s a slow change over time. You want to surprise your readers with the emotional arc when possible. Whatever emotion the character started the scene with, make sure they feel an opposite or conflicting emotion at the end of the chapter. It doesn’t have to be blatant like love and indifference. Don’t fulfil your character’s expectations. If the character goes into a scene happy but knows they’ll be betrayed by the end, there’s no surprise for the reader. The reader already knows what’s going to happen because the character does. Go back to the beginning of the scene and change up the emotional starting point.

Think of the second book in the Narnia series Prince Caspian. The Pevensies are transported back to Narnia and they have expected to be elated and overjoyed to have returned to what feels familiar, but instead, they arrive and are confused. That expected elation and joy feels a bit flat when they realize they haven’t returned to the Narnia they left.

Avoid Cliches With Metaphors And Similes

Cliches are boring for readers, they know what’s coming. Sometimes you can make that work for you, sometimes it undermines your story. So, how do you avoid clichés with your characters? First, make sure the character is telling the story – you’re not. In deep point of view, the goal is for the writer to disappear as much as possible so that the reader is living out the story WITH the main character.

Strap a Go-pro to your character and write what they see, pause at, are surprised by – as they work their way through the story. When you can do that, the next step is to infuse your character’s internal and spoken dialogue with phrases and comparisons that are unique. This is the easiest way to avoid cliché (because sometimes we write clichés and don’t even realize it).

To describe someone who’s angry, a farmer might say they’re mad as a hornet in a Coke can. A businessman might describe a meeting was as much fun as the middle seat on an international flight. What’s common to that character based on their experience and background? Choose comparisons that hint at where they’ve come from, or what’s important to them, when thinking or speaking.

Find The Key Emotional Point In Every Chapter

Your POV character is solving a problem – that’s your story. Every chapter/scene is the POV character’s plan (the next step they’ve come up with) on how to resolve or solve this problem they have. Obviously, they can’t solve their story problem in the first chapter, and there have to be obstacles between the character and whatever goal they have in.

In each scene, look at the goal the character has for that scene. List three or five possible emotions your character could be feeling. Stretch yourself here. Get curious. Why would they feel each of those emotions? What are the consequences of those emotions? What would be the personal fallout of each of those emotions? What kind of person do they think would feel that way? What judgement do they make about themselves based on how they feel about what they’re doing?

Whichever one you pick, make that emotion unique to that character in that moment.

There are many shades of fear, right. Why would that character be afraid in that moment? A character afraid of losing their job will feel differently than a character afraid of losing face by approaching a pretty girl. Answer the WHY for readers so they understand (and can empathize with and cheer for) your character’s motivations.

Will Deep Point Of View Work For You?

May 28, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 4 Comments

Will deep point of view work for you? Deep point of view is going to change your writing and even change how you read fiction, but it’s not a panacea to bestseller status. It’s just not. Deep point of view is an intermediate fiction technique that requires you to have a good foundation in basic writing skills to make it work for you.

Deep point of view is lipstick on a pig if you don’t understand story structure, character arc, tension, conflict, scenes and sequels, hooks, avoiding adverbs, passive voice, point of view, and maybe a few others that aren’t coming to my mind at the moment. If you are just starting out, focus on learning these things first. I promise you, it will save you hours and hours of editing and disappointment.

Why? Because these basic things will be all people point out to you when you’re starting out. They will see these beginning mistakes and shrug. This is a good writer, but they’re not ready to be published yet.

Been there.

However, if you’re past all those things and you’ve been writing for a bit then you’re probably ready for deep point of view. You’ve probably heard about deep point of view already and maybe wondered what it’s all about. This technique is particularly popular among any of the romance genre writers, but is growing in popularity across all popular fiction categories including fantasy, thrillers, crime, sci-fi, historicals, and others.

What Genres Does Deep Point Of View Work For?

Deep point of view brings the reader in super close to the emotional heart of a story. While action is conveyed through deep point of view effectively, the power of deep point of view is how a character feels (hence the prevalence of it being used in romance genres).

So whether your character has escaped her kidnapper, is the target of a serial killer, is parsing out whether that hot guy is worth the trouble he’s causing, is hunting for a missing child, is alone on a piece of driftwood after the Titanic has sunk, or facing down a dragon — how the character feels and how the events of the story impact their heart is where deep point of view really grabs readers by the throat and won’t let go.

What this means practically is that your story might be well-suited to using deep point of view throughout the whole novel, or is better used strategically for key scenes. It can be boiled down to a very simplistic view of character driven vs plot driven. However, every story is unique and the emotional tension might be a key aspect of a plot driven story. Only you can answer this question, and the answer might vary from one novel to another.

In a thriller, if the story is written from the victim’s POV, deep point of view could be very effective for the entire novel because his terror and self-doubt and rage are what you want the reader to connect with (the story is character driven). If the POV is the detective hunting the killer, then the concrete details of the investigation (plot driven) are the main plot drivers so using deep point of view for key scenes – like the aftermath of the discovery of a new victim, the night off when the detective chooses to drink herself into oblivion to avoid the emotions flooding her senses – could be very impactful for readers. These are trends I’ve observed, but it is overly simplistic. I think deep point of view can work for any kind of novel.

Can I Use Deep Point Of View With First Or Third Person?

Not all first person stories are written in deep point of view. I used to think that writing in first person nessicitated using deep point of view, but that’s not the case. How deep you want to delve into the emotional heart of a character and how close the reader feels to being IN the story, is the pertinent question to ask.

Deep point of view can work in either first person or third person. I’ve seen deep point of view used for one POV character and not another. I think the main point is to be consistent. If you begin writing a character in deep pov then keep that going. If you’re only using deep pov for key scenes, then keep doing that – for the whole novel.

3 Keys To Success With Deep Point Of View

Be Realistic And Authentic

Between the work from students of my Method Acting Class, submissions in my 5 Day Deep Point Of View Challenge on Facebook, and comments from readers of my Method Acting For Writers book, I’ve come to see that some writers don’t care about being realistic or authentic with emotions.

From time to time, most writers realize they’ve written a character who is being irrational, lacks focus or goals, or doesn’t face the consequences of their behavior — and we revise. We want to do better. But I’ve also encountered many writers who don’t care. They have an end goal in mind – a happily ever after or whatever, and they don’t care if the journey to get there feels real or authentic to readers. This is THEIR story and they can do what they like.

The problem with that attitude is that if these flaws are evident in your character in a shallower point of view, deep pov will only point a spotlight on them. Will there be readers who don’t care if a story is well-written or authentic? Yeah.

I’m not content to write those kinds of stories. I encourage all my students to strive for more than that too. I want to write the kind of story that impacts readers, makes them feel, is a story they want to revisit over and over — not just be an afternoon’s fling and never thought of again.

Commit To Excelling At Craft And Writing The Best You Can Write

If you want to write in deep point of view, commit to learning the strategy. Half-assing it will not create the effect you’re hoping for. Deep point of view is about so much more than avoiding distance words or telling.

Many of us are tempted to skim over details for a few common reasons. We don’t know the character well enough to know what they feel, why they feel that way, or what the impact of that emotion is on their character or actions. Sometimes we’re writing about an emotion or event that hits a little too close to home and we’d just rather skim over the details and get back to the story. If that’s the case, change the story event. You’re the author. You’re allowed to change things like that and still get your character to feel a particular way. Sometimes you have to put the story aside for a time until you’ve found some healing and perspective for yourself first.

Be mindful of your own mental health though. We’ve all read stories of actors who took method acting a step or two too far and paid some heavy mental health consequences as a result. Be kind to yourself. Take a break when needed. Talk with a friend, spouse, or therapist. Hey – athletes don’t hestitate to go to physio, a chiropractor, or massage therapist if it will help their performance. If your trade is writing emotions with authenticity and realism, then talking to someone who’s an expert on those things is a business expense and those experts are part of your support team.

Be Strategic

Know what effect you want to create in any given scene, where you want the character to go/feel/do as a result of any scene, and use the best tool for the job. This is hard if you don’t know what tools you have at hand or how to use them.

There are troves of blogs out there excusing telling without explaining how to use it strategically. There are blogs that only repeat the basic foundational steps for writing in deep point of view – they offer the top drawer tools in a tool box and neglect to mention all the bottom of the box tools you also need or have at hand. Sure, you can put on base boards with a hammer and nails, but a pro is going to use a nail gun. Learn the pro tools for a better overall finished effect.

4 Tips To Get Unstuck Writing Hard Emotions In Fiction

May 22, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 2 Comments

Emotions are hard to capture authentically in fiction, maybe in part because as a society we tend to want to express things more in terms of what we’re doing or thinking. This diving deep into the raw humanity expressed through emotions is the power of deep point of view.

How You Doin Joey GIF from Howyoudoin GIFs

Emotions are hard and uncomfortable and sometimes inconvenient and there’s an inherent vulnerability in writing — in good writing — where the writer lays bare her own heart for readers in a variety of ways.

I’m an avid student of psychology and learning how emotions work intrigues me, so being able to authentically capture all this for my readers is important to me. And if you’re here on this blog, I know it’s important to you too because that’s kinda… I mean *smile* that’s what I blog about alot. What I’ve been digging into recently is trying to better understand how emotions work, how much predictability there is in terms of the consequences of past events on adult behaviour, and the dichotomy between what’s expressed outwardly (what’s observable to others) and what’s said and felt internally.

To that end, here are four aspects of writing emotions that I’ve focused on with my characters with good results. You might not use/need all of these for any one novel or even a character, but they are tools to keep in your pocket and pull out if you’re stuck or struggling how to convey an emotion authentically.

All The Girls At The Table

A friend (who’s a counsellor) described this idea of the girls at the table which she uses with her clients and it really resonated with writer-me. When emotions for your character get hot, confusing, sad, overwhelming, uncomfortable, create foggy thinking — get curious as Brene Brown would say. What’s driving those emotions for your character? Whether your character has enough self-awareness or personal insight to figure it out or not, you need to know. Why do they feel like this? Why does this hurt? What are they really upset about? Why don’t they want to be here?

This can be transformative. Get curious about your character’s emotions. Why are they feeling that way? Why don’t they want anyone to know they feel that way? What are they afraid of?

Now, add in my friend’s advice. Sit down with all the girls at the table. For every hurt moment or traumatic event in life, imagine that kid (girl or guy) at the table. Each traumatic event or hurtful moment adds another seat at the table of the heart. That group, collectively and individually, influences which past events are triggered in the present. Ask that kid – why are you afraid? What are you trying to hide? You’re hurt about this — but what does this really mean?

I have a character who’d made plans for a vacation with a close friend, and the close friend had to bail at the last minute (legitimate reason) but my character was devastated by this. The reaction wasn’t in line with what had happened so as the writer, I had to get curious. Why was this so hurtful? I realized the hurt was legitimate disappointment about not going on the trip but there was something more. There was a kid at the table slumped in her seat, arms folded over her chest, kicking her feet against the legs of the chair. That friend routinely cancelled, for always legitimate reasons, and there were past disappointments at play.

Another kid at the table cried. This was a younger still kid, she remembered that many many times her needs were ignored, overlooked, told they didn’t matter as much as someone else’s. THAT’s the kid causing the tears because once again she had felt unimportant, not a priority, passed over. Once you have this information, you can express the primary emotions at play with visceral authenticity that will capture your readers. Read more about primary and secondary emotions here.

Feelings Aren’t Facts

Feelings and emotions can’t always be trusted. As someone who struggles with foggy thinking at times because of a post traumatic stress injury, this has become super important to remind myself of.

Just because I feel a certain way, doesn’t mean that feeling is true or trustworthy. Because there’s a lot of past experiences and prejudices at play (see above with all the girls at the table) that can influence, skew, and colour my perception of what’s going on around me or being said (or not said).

This is important to understand, because emotions and feelings power our goals, motivations, and priorities. Where does your character’s feelings lead them astray? How does their past influence them to incorrectly evaluate a situation or threat? At what point do they realize their feelings may not be trustworthy in any given situation or recurring circumstance? What are the consequences of the thinking based on feelings that can’t be trusted? OOooh – tell me you can see all the conflict that potentially arises from this?

Emotions Aren’t Stable

Being emotionally stable is nebulous though highly sought after. We tend to avoid people we perceive to be emotionally unstable. Here’s the thing though, we’re all emotionally unstable at times and our characters can’t always have it all all together either. Just as feelings aren’t facts, emotions are neither static nor linear. Some days our emotions bounce from one conflicting emotion to another like a ping pong ball. We have what’s called a “window of tolerance” and anyone can be pushed out of their window of tolerance (the ability to function, perceive, and integrate information and emotions effectively) at any time.

Those perceived as emotionally unstable are often individuals with a narrower window of tolerance. However, a car accident will push you out of the window of tolerance. A sudden death in the family or a close friend will likely push you out of the window of tolerance. Those with anxiety or traumatic injuries will likely have a narrower window of tolerance and a learned response to certain triggers (hyper arousal -fight or flight- or hypo arousal – freeze).

Most of the time, as writers, we craft a situation (or several situations) in a story where we push our characters out of their window of tolerance which means they’ll be emotionally unstable. Be authentic with that. Let there be consequences to that. Let them learn from that. Will that experience narrow or widen their window of tolerance? Hmmm…

Emotions Are Subtle And Nuanced

Speaking of wide brushes, I hope I’ve made a case for drilling down into why a character feels a certain way, determining how much intergrity those feelings have, and the natural consequences of that unique blend of factors combined with a character’s past experiences, prejudices, goals, and motivations. If you’re able to know your characters well enough to have all this sorted, then deep point of view is going to intensify your fiction and grab your readers by the throat!

Not every emotion your character feels needs to be BIG. Not every decision needs to be based on a BIG emotion. Sometimes we’re ruled by emotions we refuse to acknowledge but are readily picked up on by others. Avoid the easy road with your fiction. These are really simple factors that when combined create endless possibilities. It’s the possibilities that make each character unique.

Not every character needs to be thought through to this level, but certainly your protagonist and antagonist do.

Which character(s) from your favourite book or movie had an emotional journey that really resonated with you?

Advice From Jack Sparrow On Building Emotional Connections With Readers

March 6, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 7 Comments

Captain Jack Sparrow, love him or hate him, most people FEEL something for the irrascible pirate. What can Jack Sparrow teach us about creating emotional connections with readers? Lots. Savvy?

There are many posts out there on the interwebz for writers looking for advice on how to create emotional connections with readers, but let’s look at a character many many people love but may not be able to put a finger on why.

Jack Sparrow Is Relateable

When creating a character you want readers to connect with, give them traits that your reader might share. It’s hard to put yourself into a story, into someone’s shoes if you can’t see yourself in any of their character traits or decisions.

Jack is selfish and deceptive and he appears morally bankrupt, so why do we love him? He literally stumbles through life. But we love Jack because we have a lot of things in common with him. No, really – we do.

He prefers to talk his way out of trouble instead of using brute force, even though he has the sword skills to do great injury. He’s intelligent and witty and uses those strengths to his advantage. Jack is immeasurably creative.

“Did everyone see that? Because I will not be doing that again.”
Jack Sparrow

Jack is OK with ambiguity. Today’s enemy could be tomorrow’s ally. He’ll steal your rum one day and shake your hand the next. Jack’s morality tends to be situational, but isn’t that also true of our own society where little white lies, no harm no foul, and other such sayings are held as truth. A person might never steal a chocolate bar or clothing from a retail store, but they’ll pirate movies or music or ebooks without thought. The character who always chooses the moral right, who’s never dishonest or corruptible in any way, is hard to relate to.

Jack’s An Ethical Pirate

Your character needs to stand for something. They have to draw a line in the sand — this far and no farther. That line will look different for every character and that line doesn’t have to be one that readers necessarily would choose for themselves, but it’s one they can cheer for. Readers connect emotionally with characters who have a code of ethics they won’t violate–an ethic the reader can cheer for.

Jack is a complicated character and whether he’s good or bad is often up for interpretation. Certainly, he’s no moral paragon, but unlike many other pirates Jack does his best to uphold the Pirate’s code. Jack isn’t a pacifist, but he often steps in and tries to de-escalate an impending conflict (often for self-interested reasons) by suggesting a negotiation. When he does draw his sword, it’s in self-defence.

“Why fight when you can negotiate?”
Jack Sparrow

Let’s not forget that the reason Jack was branded a pirate was because instead of delivering a shipment of slaves, he set them free. Jack, in the end, often chooses the morally right thing to do at his own personal sacrifice, even if he’s doing it for selfish reasons. He rescued his friends from the Kraaken (and the Pearl), he walked away from the fountain of youth, and he helped break the curse of the The Flying Dutchman to free Will Turner.

“Not all treasure is silver and gold, mate.”
Jack Sparrow

Jack Is Always The Underdog

Readers love to cheer on the come-from-behind-kid, the one who succeeds against all odds, the David in a David-and-Goliath story, the nerd fighting against the schoolyard bully. When a character faces overwhelming odds, when they choose to step into a hard thing when they could walk away, readers get behind that. They want the character to win. But let me clear, the odds need to be overwhelming and preferably the stakes are life and death. I don’t mean only literal life and death stakes, but identity-ending, career-suicide, life-is-no-longer-worth-living kind of stakes.

In every movie, Jack has a goal–there’s something he wants. His motivations aren’t always obvious or clear, sometimes even to himself, but he presses on even though the odds of him succeeding are fairly remote (hello – finding the fountain of youth??).

“I’m dishonest, and a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest. Honestly, it’s the honest ones you want to watch out for because you can never predict when they’re going to do something incredibly…stupid.”
Jack Sparrow

Jack Teaches Us Things

Readers want entertainment AND they want an emotional journey. They want to immerse themselves in a fictive dream and become a character, live vicariously through them, for a short period of time. Fiction helps challenge people’s thinking and offers new perspectives and paths for readers in a non-threatening way. It’s OK if you only want to entertain with your writing, but it’s OK if you want to use if for more than entertainment too.

“If you choose to lock your heart away, you’ll lose it for certain.”
Jack Sparrow

Jack is a character a lot of people wish they could be more like (in certain ways). Jack is comfortable in his own skin, in the expression of his personality, and doesn’t care too much what other people think of him. He doesn’t take offense easily and doesn’t hold a grudge. He lives in the moment

Jack very much lives in the moment. He doesn’t concern himself with a five year plan or even where he’ll sleep that night. Jack embodies freedom. “Wherever we want to go, we’ll go. That’s what a ship is, you know. It’s not just a keel and hull and deck and sails–that’s what a ship needs. But what a ship is–what the Black Pearl really is–is freedom.” Jack has simple wants: to be a pirate and to be captain of the Black Pearl. Most of us, in some way, long for that kind of free-spirited freedom, ability to laugh at ourselves, own our eccentricities and quirks, and care less what people think of us.

Jack Surprises Us

Writing that has readers leaning in, afraid to put the book down because they have to know what happens next — that’s the goal, right? That’s my goal. The surprises have to be true to the character and the storyworld, often the surprise causes the main character even more trouble, but we cheer them on even harder.

Jack constantly surprises us. He’s funny. His wit and charm are disarming and the way he plays with the truth makes you feel like you’re inner circle sharing an inside joke. His antics, his flailings, his reliance on rum, it all adds up to entertainment and surprise. A joke isn’t funny if you already know the punchline, right. Sometimes his wit is full of great truth. Sometimes you have to repeat to yourself what he’s just said, and then it hits you — ooooh, that’s deep.

“You’ve stolen me and I’m here to take myself back.”
Jack Sparrow

“The problem is not the problem. The problem is your attitude about the problem. Understand me?”
Jack Sparrow

What do you love about Jack Sparrow? In what ways did you (or did you not) connect emotionally with Jack?