Subtext in dialogue give readers a glimpse into the characters’ underlying feelings. The words they say may mean the opposite of how they feel or how they act. Subtext is the truth which sometimes the characters don’t realize and sometimes they do but they keep it hidden. Readers need to sense the truth from the […]
How Do your Characters Shake Hands?
Handshakes communicate dominance, submission, or equality. When hands meet, if one person turns his or her palm facing down, it’s called the Upper Hand and means that person wants control of the meeting. The submissive handshake is from the person whose palm faces upward. In social situations, women often offer a soft handshake to men […]
Your Characters’ Handwriting
Vimala Rodgers wrote a book called Change Your Handwriting, Change Your Life. The description on the back cover, states that handwriting is “a road map to the psyche, a clear path through the winding labyrinth of our personality. Every loop and flourish reveals an attitude, each line and slant displays a quality.” Several years ago, […]
Overheard Conversations for Writer Inspiration
One of the assignments in a writing class I took several years ago was to listen to a conversation in a restaurant and use it to inspire a story. I choose a few words I overheard by two women who sat at a table near us one evening in Utah. The story I wrote had […]
Writing Body Language with Gestures
When writers describe body language, it’s often done with one simple sentence, such as Viv furrowed her brow. The meaning can be misleading without supportive evidence in how she’s feeling. Is she confused? Is she angry with what was said? Or is she in pain? Gesture clusters reveal more accurate information. For instance in this […]
Quotes About Reader Emotions in Writing
Jerry Cleaver in his book, Immediate Fiction, said, “It’s not just about giving the reader an experience. It’s about having it yourself, as you create. Character, reader, author—they’re all having the experience, the emotion. Without emotion, nobody’s having anything.” Cleaver also said, “The first thing to realize is that the world is emotionally determined. Passion, […]
Rhetorical Device Polysyndeton
The rhetorical device, polysyndeton, is the opposite of asyndeton, the term I explained in my last post. Asyndeton omits conjunctions between words, phrases, or clauses. Polysyndeton adds several conjunctions in close succession between each word, phrase, or clause without commas. It makes the sentence slower and the items more emphatic than in asyndeton. The repetition […]