The Secrets to Effective Descriptions in Novels

When you, as the author of a novel, describe a scene, character or setting, you’re painting a verbal picture for your reader. You’re using sensory detail to immerse your reader in your words. A well-written description should do the same thing as dialogue; it should move the story forward and add to characterization. 

The secret to presenting descriptions in a novel is all about discipline and imagination. It may seem odd to relate those two things, but it’s important for the successful author to understand this association. The discipline, I’m afraid, is the responsibility of the writer while the reader gets the fun part, the imagination.


As writers we must discipline ourselves to give readers what it is they want to read. And this takes us to why people purchase novels in the first place. After all, they know its fiction, and therefore a lie. Don’t we spend most of our lives trying not to buy someone else’s lies? Why then would the reader put up his hard-earned money to purchase a stranger’s lie? It’s because novel writers take the reader on an adventure, someplace they can never experience, but only imagine. The reader uses his imagination to create personal pictures your words represent. These mental pictures are relevant to him and him alone, making the story more realistic and personal. His imagination does most of the author’s work of transporting the reader to that netherworld he craves.


Consider, if you will, a warm, sunny day with you racing down the open road in a sleek convertible. Your favorite music is blaring as your hair whips in the wind and the love of your life snuggles next to you.


Oh, I forgot to mention, the convertible is pea-green.


I just gave you too much information, didn’t I? The enjoyable picture you’d fashioned in your mind just slipped a notch, didn’t it? It might have been ruined altogether, because of one word too many. So it is with descriptions in your novels.


It’s all about their imagination, not your writing skills. You may be able to paint a wondrous image with your words, but its’ not about your words. It’s about the pictures the reader creates.


So, the true secret to describing anything is to discipline yourself to describe only those necessary things, and then to describe them with no more words than necessary to evoke the readers imagination.


Here are some tips on how to create your descriptions.


Blend, don’t list, characteristics. That is to present details within action. Instead of telling the reader about the many multicolored wildflowers in the field, have the protagonist picking the flowers. Have him mention the many colors, hand the multicolored bouquet he’s gathered to his love, etc. Unless they’re important to the story, don’t just describe the flowers use them within the actions of your characters.


Don’t describe too many things. Descriptions slow a story and the more of them you have, the worse your writing will appear.


When you do describe something, consider the not so obvious details and offer the reader something to spark their imagination. For example, you might mention not only the bright light seeping into the room from between the slats of the blinds, but how the plants on the desk arch their leaves toward the limited sunlight.


I’ve already mentioned descriptions slow scene. You might use one, however, if you wish to retard the action and give your readers a breather.


Use nebulous rather than specific words. This allows the reader to use their imagination. For example, she doesn’t have eyes the size of silver dollars, she has oversized eyes. The reader will determine for himself what “oversized” means.


Avoid flowery language, especially the abuse of adjectives and adverbs. His “gangly approach toward the cusp of manhood” might be reworded to say “he turned fifteen.”


A rule of thumb is a description should be kept to no more than four or five sentences. Never use five when two will do the trick.


Describe those things that differ every time you see one. There’s little need to portray a red rose, as it’s pretty much a red rose everywhere you go. (Yes, I know there are a million varieties, but when you write, “rose,” the identical image come to almost everyone’s mind.) An antique pocket watch, however, is unique almost every time.


Effective descriptions are difficult to master, but mastering the technique will lift your writing to a new level. Best of luck.


Until next time, I wish you only best-sellers.


C. Patrick Schulze

How & Why to Use Conflict Types

In yesterday’s post I discussed how the secret to a successful novel can be found within the conflict you create for your protagonist. Without conflict, you have no novel. It creates the backbone for your story.

Many novice writers are surprised to learn you don’t find conflict in the explosions, the typhoons, the meteors crashing into the earth. You find conflict in your characters’ emotional reaction to these stimuli.

There are two types of conflict, internal and external, and each brings different amounts of action and tension to your story. Internal conflict, a character at odds with himself, consists of the emotional or psychological predicaments a character faces and the impact it has upon him. In “The Da Vinci Code,” we saw Tom Hank’s fear of enclosed spaces, his claustrophobia. As a writer, you should employ internal conflicts that reflect those universal emotions in people; safety, fear, love, sadness and the like. This is one way to reinforce your readers’ emotional attachment to your story. External conflict, a character at odds with the world around him, is found in the emotional responses your characters experience relative to outside influences. These can be anything from a wound to a troll to a husband-beating wife. This reaction, I think, is the reason the Bruce Willis movies are so well-received. His responses to the many threats he faces are always entertaining, though realistic.

I once read a way to exemplify conflict when writing a novel and I apologize but I do not remember who said it. Regardless, he said to find your hero’s Achilles’ heel and crush it. The heel is the internal conflict and the crushing is the external. Find your hero’s root emotional vulnerability and use it against him.

I watched the movie, “12 Rounds” the other night and the director handled conflict reasonably well. In one scene, the hero has a difficult decision to make. Should he allow the cops to kill the villain, who has kidnapped the woman in the hero’s life, or should he save the evildoer so his love will live longer. Of course, he saves the bad guy. It isn’t all the screaming, breaking glass and shooting that created the conflict, it’s found in the emotional decision the hero had to make – who lives and who dies - that created the tension. The external conflict came to life in how the hero responded to all the shooting to save two people. The internal conflict grew from his decision to save the bad guy. This combination of internal and external conflict is what you strive for in your novels.

This weakness is the origin of your novel’s conflict and also the source of your hero’s growth.

We’ve all heard our hero needs to grow during the course of the story and become a better person. By overcoming his flaw(s), his growth materializes. As the hero pin-balls from one issue to the next, he must face his fears and, with each new confrontation, he learns how to overcome that which frightens him. Without this growth, rooted in conflict, your reader is robbed of his expected satisfaction. And if your readers won’t be satisfied, why even bother to write the story?

If you have any questions, drop a comment and I’ll see if I can’t assist you on an individual basis.

Until we meet again, I wish you best-sellers.

C. Patrick Schulze
Twitter.con/CPatrickSchulze

The secret to any good story is the problem that requires solving. In fact, without this all-important central problem, known as conflict, you have no novel. Conflict is critical for it draws your reader into your story and is the key component that weaves all the elements of your novel together.

The secret to conflict is to know what it is. As I outlined in an earlier post, (click here), conflict is not the crisis or what happens to your characters. It is not the battle, the argument or the deception. Conflict rests upon their thoughts and feelings, toward these events your characters experience. It’s found within the moral choices they make. It’s within the building, then exploding tension between opposing forces.

There are two types of conflict, external and internal. External is obvious, such as lava coursing down the mountainside and setting flame to the town. Internal is less apparent, as might be the feelings of your protagonist when he realizes there is no way to save his business from succumbing to the onslaught of the fiery magma. Further, when dealing with this central clash that swirls about your hero, the successful novel writer will often have a number of lesser conflicts that are birthed due to the premier conflict point. For example, once his livelihood disappears within the flames, his wife leaves him, taking the children with her. (Boy, this guy has had a bad day!)

Regardless the types or amount of conflict, your writing is for naught if you don’t convince your reader to appreciate the power, the importance, of the conflict. They must know and become emotionally involved due to this struggle. As with the family mentioned about, if the readers want the wife to leave, for example, the conflict diminishes, as does your story. (This means the readers need to like your hero, doesn’t it? But that’s for another post.)

To enhance the readers’ interest, insure they see what your hero has to gain and lose. If they never see the flames racing toward the business, or they never learn how unsupportive the wife becomes, their interest will be less than peaked. It’s also helpful if there are negative repercussions to his solving, as well as not solving, the conflict. If your hero must choose between the lesser of evils to resolve the core conflict, you’ll heighten the story even more. For example, would you have greater conflict if your hero watches his business explode in flame knowing his wife will take his children if he loses his business? You bet.

There should not be too many conflict points, but regardless their number or how they develop, conflict is at the heart of any novel and must be resolved in one fashion or another. This resolution will make or break your novel. Make sure your conclusion is logical and results from the actions of your hero. It cannot be random or arbitrary.

One last thought about conflict. The guy in the white hat need not always win.
Until we meet again, I wish you best-sellers.

C. Patrick Schulze