# Brilliant writing advice from Chuck Palahniuk- 'In six seconds, you'll hate me.'



## Scarlett_R (Sep 30, 2011)

I hadn't seen this posted here, but this has shot straight up into my top 5 best pieces of writing advice, so I had to share.

Writing Advice: by Chuck Palahniuk
_In six seconds, you'll hate me.
But in six months, you'll be a better writer._

From this point forward-at least for the next half year-you may not use "thought" verbs. These include: Thinks, Knows, Understands, Realizes, Believes, Wants, Remembers, Imagines, Desires, and a hundred others you love to use.

The list should also include: Loves and Hates.
And it should include: Is and Has, but we'll get to those later.

Until some time around Christmas, you can't write: Kenny wondered if Monica didn't like him going out at night&#8230;"

Instead, you'll have to Un-pack that to something like: "The
mornings after Kenny had stayed out, beyond the last bus, until he'd had to bum a ride or pay for a cab and got home to find Monica faking sleep, faking because she never slept that quiet, those mornings, she'd only put her own cup of coffee in the microwave. Never his."

Instead of characters knowing anything, you must now present the details that allow the reader to know them. Instead of a character wanting something, you must now describe the thing so that the reader wants it.

Instead of saying: "Adam knew Gwen liked him." You'll have to say: "Between classes, Gwen had always leaned on his locker when he'd go to open it. She's roll her eyes and shove off with one foot, leaving a black-heel mark on the painted metal, but she also left the smell of her perfume. The combination lock would still be warm from her butt. And the next break, Gwen would be leaned there, again."

In short, no more short-cuts. Only specific sensory detail: action, smell, taste, sound, and feeling.

Typically, writers use these "thought" verbs at the beginning of a paragraph (In this form, you can call them "Thesis Statements" and I'll rail against those, later). In a way, they state the intention of the paragraph. And what follows, illustrates them.

For example:
"Brenda knew she'd never make the deadline. was backed up from the bridge, past the first eight or nine exits. Her cell phone battery was dead. At home, the dogs would need to go out, or there would be a mess to clean up. Plus, she'd promised to water the plants for her neighbor&#8230;"

Do you see how the opening "thesis statement" steals the thunder of what follows? Don't do it.

If nothing else, cut the opening sentence and place it after all the others. Better yet, transplant it and change it to: Brenda would never make the deadline.

Thinking is abstract. Knowing and believing are intangible. Your story will always be stronger if you just show the physical actions and details of your characters and allow your reader to do the thinking and knowing. And loving and hating.

Don't tell your reader: "Lisa hated Tom."

Instead, make your case like a lawyer in court, detail by detail.

Present each piece of evidence. For example: "During roll call, in the breath after the teacher said Tom's name, in that moment before he could answer, right then, Lisa would whisper-shout 'Butt Wipe,' just as Tom was saying, 'Here'."

One of the most-common mistakes that beginning writers make is leaving their characters alone. Writing, you may be alone. Reading, your audience may be alone. But your character should spend very, very little time alone. Because a solitary character starts thinking or worrying or wondering.

For example: Waiting for the bus, Mark started to worry about how long the trip would take&#8230;"

A better break-down might be: "The schedule said the bus would come by at noon, but Mark's watch said it was already 11:57. You could see all the way down the road, as far as the Mall, and not see a bus. No doubt, the driver was parked at the turn-around, the far end of the line, taking a nap. The driver was kicked back, asleep, and Mark was going to be late. Or worse, the driver was drinking, and he'd pull up drunk and charge Mark seventy-five cents for death in a fiery traffic accident&#8230;"

A character alone must lapse into fantasy or memory, but even then you can't use "thought" verbs or any of their abstract relatives.

Oh, and you can just forget about using the verbs forget and remember.

No more transitions such as: "Wanda remembered how Nelson used to brush her hair."

Instead: "Back in their sophomore year, Nelson used to brush her hair with smooth, long strokes of his hand."

Again, Un-pack. Don't take short-cuts.

Better yet, get your character with another character, fast.
Get them together and get the action started. Let their actions and words show their thoughts. You-stay out of their heads.

And while you're avoiding "thought" verbs, be very wary about using the bland verbs "is" and "have."

For example:
"Ann's eyes are blue."

"Ann has blue eyes."

Versus:

"Ann coughed and waved one hand past her face, clearing the cigarette smoke from her eyes, blue eyes, before she smiled&#8230;"

Instead of bland "is" and "has" statements, try burying your details of what a character has or is, in actions or gestures. At its most basic, this is showing your story instead of telling it.

And forever after, once you've learned to Un-pack your characters, you'll hate the lazy writer who settles for: "Jim sat beside the telephone, wondering why Amanda didn't call."

Please. For now, hate me all you want, but don't use thought verbs. After Christmas, go crazy, but I'd bet money you won't.

(&#8230

For this month's homework, pick through your writing and circle every "thought" verb. Then, find some way to eliminate it. Kill it by Un-packing it.

Then, pick through some published fiction and do the same thing. Be ruthless.

"Marty imagined fish, jumping in the moonlight&#8230;"

"Nancy recalled the way the wine tasted&#8230;"

"Larry knew he was a dead man&#8230;"

Find them. After that, find a way to re-write them. Make them stronger.

--------------------------

__
https://56767779934%2Fwriting-advice-by-chuck-palahniuk-in-six


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## DCBourone (Sep 10, 2012)

Tender and loving advice from a writer who is already 'known.'

He is writing to and for a past which no longer exists.

Dalya said 'subtle is dead.'

A quick review of the top 100 titles on Kindle will reveal the
inverse/reverse/negation of this advice.

Subtle is dead.

What a shame.


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## SWF (Jun 14, 2011)

That's a fantastic bit of advice. Explains the 'show don't tell' rule brilliantly.


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## Guest (Jul 30, 2013)

Thanks for sharing that subtle and wonderful advice!


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## Joe_Nobody (Oct 23, 2012)

Okay... If this is an exercise for a writing class, then I can see the point.

If this is advice for someone actually writing a book, then I think it goes overboard.

There are times when I want to relay that my character _is_ thinking, and I want to do so quickly and concisely.

A couple of the examples given seemed excessive... overdone.

Again, as a teaching tool, I can see it. If I started to read a book written using this method, I probably wouldn't finish.


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## Ben Mathew (Jan 27, 2013)

I write books on economics and finance, so I'm not often faced with "showing" versus "telling". But, as a reader, I had a hard time figuring out what the "shows" in the above examples were "telling." As Joe said, maybe a "telling" can sometimes be clearer and shorter.


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## JeanneM (Mar 21, 2011)

This was probably very good advice.  But he was wrong about one thing: I hated him in 5 seconds.


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## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

I'm glad I read that, as I've been falling back into some old habits and needed a reminder.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

Joe's got the right end of the stick here.

In selected scenes, it can work brilliantly, but sometimes you have to take the short road if you want to move your plot along.

To quote my favourite writer, C.J. Cherryh: "Don't follow every writing rule ... off a cliff."


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## dalya (Jul 26, 2011)

Was laughing too hard to finish reading opening post.

It's taken me the last year to get rid of all the terrible "training" from the "how to write to impress a literary agent/your old English prof/people who buy three books a year after they win major awards" manuals.


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## Pamela (Oct 6, 2010)

Thank you Dalya!


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## rainvilleadam (Jan 9, 2013)

I doubt anyone who has read Palahniuk thinks (wait...whoops!) that he writes to impress English professors. I've seen him speak before and he is an amazing entertainer and truly loves his fans. He signed 3 books for me, answered a question of mine while I was waiting in line, and offered to have a picture taken with me - all without me asking. That has made me a lifelong fan of his (though I found his last couple of books to be sub-par). Plus, he holds writing forums on his website and spends a lot of time giving "advice" to new writers. As far as established authors taking the time to help new writers, he's done more than just about anyone can think of.

Of course, any writer worth his or her salt knows that no advice should be followed 100% of the time. Personally, I think that this is a good lesson that could help a lot of people think about which words they use. On the other hand, if one was to always replace verbs such as "thinking," etc., with a short paragraphs, his or her writing would become pretty tedious.


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

To a certain degree, I agree with this advice. But as Joe and others have noted, it doesn't always work. Honestly, some of the examples were a bit overboard. 

Still, must strive to apply this to my work."(. . .) specific sensory detail: action, smell, taste, sound, and feeling."


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## Gone 9/21/18 (Dec 11, 2008)

Joe_Nobody said:


> If this is advice for someone actually writing a book, then I think it goes overboard.
> 
> There are times when I want to relay that my character _is_ thinking, and I want to do so quickly and concisely.


Ya _think_? Consider his examples. Never deviating from writing that way would turn a 100,000-word novel into a 300,000-word novel. Then again, I suppose it would have the advantage of turning a short story into a not-much-plot novel.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

This is writing advice. Not publishing/selling/marketing advice.


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## Hugh Howey (Feb 11, 2012)

This is a fantastic rule to master.

And then break often.


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## KellyHarper (Jul 29, 2012)

Bear in mind that his target audience isn't a group of people who are actively engaged in the business of writing professionally. His target audience is anyone who wants to improve their writing.

As was already mentioned in this thread--if you're "worth your salt", you'll know that you can't follow every rule every time. Things must be ignored.

What C.P. is saying here is wonderful advice for someone who's figuring out their voice, and who's trying to become a more engaging writer.


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## Ashy (Jul 2, 2013)

Hugh Howey said:


> This is a fantastic rule to master.
> 
> And then break often.


^^^ THIS.


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## MichelleGordon (Jun 8, 2012)

Very interesting advice, will make me a little more aware of allowing my characters to express themselves rather than me telling the audience what they think and how they feel.

Thanks for the great post


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## Dee Ernst (Jan 10, 2011)

There are two types of readers - people who read for plot, action or character, and people who read because they love words.  This advice is perfect if you're writing for the word-lovers, because they will take a sentence and roll it around in their brain for a few minutes, savoring every syllable.
But for the other type of reader, the same sentence would be a snooze-fest.
Every writer needs to show, not tell, but every writer also needs to write for their audience.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

The "unpacking"-concept is interesting.
As for the rest, paraphrasing Dorothy Parker, some advice is not to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.


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## Zoe York (May 12, 2013)

I don't hate him at all. I don't agree with the first line, because it's not an all or nothing game, but he's not wrong that better writing comes from unpacking significant moments and presenting all the bits that the character experiences. And sometimes, it's better reading. It is when it's done well, anyway. 

I'm a romance novel slut. I'll read pretty much anything with a squee-tastic happy ever after ending. There are only 3 books that I didn't finish last year. One was riddled with typos. Two were overwritten. 

But flip that around. I read a *ton* of romance novels. The best ones I read last year? Showed me those big moments in exactly the way he describes. I don't mind books that tell me most of the story. I don't expect or even want to read literary tomes most of the time. But I love literary moments in ordinary, everyday stories.


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## Guest (Jul 30, 2013)

rainvilleadam said:


> I doubt anyone who has read Palahniuk thinks (wait...whoops!) that he writes to impress English professors.


But he is trade published, and therefore the enemy. He obviously hates indies and wants them to fail, so he is giving them bad advice. He doesn't know annnnnyyyyttttthhhhhhiiinnnnnnggggg at all about publishing today because he is one of those dinosaurs that kisses up to the butts of trade publishers.

Don't you know the rules by now?


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

Dee Ernst said:


> There are two types of readers - people who read for plot, action or character, and people who read because they love words. This advice is perfect if you're writing for the word-lovers, because they will take a sentence and roll it around in their brain for a few minutes, savoring every syllable.
> But for the other type of reader, the same sentence would be a snooze-fest.
> Every writer needs to show, not tell, but every writer also needs to write for their audience.


It's not possible to love words, sentences and turns-of-phrase *and* love plot, action and character? Who knew?


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## Ian Marks (Jan 22, 2012)

KellyHarper said:


> Bear in mind that his target audience isn't a group of people who are actively engaged in the business of writing professionally. His target audience is anyone who wants to improve their writing.
> 
> As was already mentioned in this thread--if you're "worth your salt", you'll know that you can't follow every rule every time. Things must be ignored.
> 
> What C.P. is saying here is wonderful advice for someone who's figuring out their voice, and who's trying to become a more engaging writer.


This. Exactly. The O.P. was addressing the wrong audience here; it is better suited to the "Intro to Creative Writing" crowd.


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

Hugh Howey said:


> This is a fantastic rule to master.
> 
> And then break often.


The corollary perhaps being: follow more often than not.

A similar exercise in show, don't tell would be to write in third person objective, i.e., with no interiority, no inner thoughts allowed. Dashiell Hammett's personal favorite novel of his own was The Glass Key, written entirely in third person objective. The Maltese Falcon was about 97% no interiority.


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## Guest (Jul 30, 2013)

Ian Marks said:


> This. Exactly. The O.P. was addressing the wrong audience here; it is better suited to the "Intro to Creative Writing" crowd.


A writer who thinks he already knows everything about the craft tends to be a rather stagnant writer. One doesn't stop learning simply because you figured out how to upload a file to Amazon. At least, I would hope.


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

I like some of this in terms of making me aware of where I can make characters more interesting. "Take what you need and leave the rest" is what I'm getting from this.

Now if I could only ditch my love for cliche phrases before I write them, rather than kick them to the curb during the edits.
Totally guilty of things like "through and through" "sigh with relief" "hot under the collar" crawling skin, eye to eye seeing, and ice berg tips.

"all greek to me" is problematic when you're five thousand years in the future and "what on Earth?" isn't going to happen on another planet


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

Quiss said:


> "all greek to me" is problematic when you're five thousand years in the future and "what on Earth?" isn't going to happen on another planet


Try "all Tralphamadorean to me" and "What on Vulcan?"


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> A writer who thinks he already knows everything about the craft tends to be a rather stagnant writer. One doesn't stop learning simply because you figured out how to upload a file to Amazon. At least, I would hope.


This. I know when I go into edit mode on my WIP I'll have this article at the front of my mind. I know for a fact that I have the "thesis" sentence in there a number of times. Now I have some advice on how to improve it.


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

"Instead of characters knowing anything, you must now present the details that allow the reader to know them."

I've been taught--and have always assumed it to be true--that subtlety is a big part of the art of literature. But why? I haven't really focused on the why straight on before. Off the top of my head, I'd say that when you clobber the reader over the head with "this character thinks precisely this about that" then reader interactivity with the text is reduced. If you instead provided the details suggestive of what the character thinks, then the reader can determine for his/her self the exact thought or the degree of feeling, the reader can in a sense write the novel as a coauthor. That sounds more fun to me as a reader, more immersive too. And perhaps it's more reflective of reality in that we don't ever really know exactly what other people are thinking.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

One more thing:

If you sent your WIP off to a paid editor and it came back with feedback to do just what CP is saying here. Would you ignore it the same way?

This is free advice from a best selling author. One whose work (not just sales) I happen to admire. And one whose work has gone through the full-on editing process numerous times. CP didn't just make this up out of thin air, or pull it from an intro to creative writing textbook. He has probably been dinged dozens of times in his own work for ignoring this advice. And when he makes the correction he realizes that the passage, and the book, are better for it. This is advice from experience. And if you've read any of CPs work you'd know that it's not "overwritten".


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

NathanWrann said:


> This. I know when I go into edit mode on my WIP I'll have this article at the front of my mind. I know for a fact that I have the "thesis" sentence in there a number of times. Now I have some advice on how to improve it.


Another catchier way to recall this "thesis" sentence business: it's "Tell, then show" instead of "show, don't tell."


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## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

I loved it and it's something I try to do as much as possible. I do think falling back on the stuff he's telling us to nix can lead to weak writing/storytelling.

Like anything it's a balance though. If you did this kind of drawn out set up for every little thing, every book would be a trilogy. So mix it up imo.

M


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## S. Shine (Jan 14, 2013)

For me, reading that kind of well meant advice does more harm than good. 

I think, I'll just stick to my own voice, for better or worse.  At least it's my own and not an attempt at emulating what others decided in my absence is or isn't acceptable.


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## TexasGirl (Dec 21, 2011)

I think this is excellent advice if taken in moderation (and not in his black and white terms of "don't write thinks, believes" etc until Christmas.)

It's always a good idea to see if there are places in your book where the shorthand (He thought about her constantly) can be expanded to create a stronger point. (Twice he stumbled off the curb on his way to class, picturing the red dress she wore last night.)

But don't do it 100% of the time or you will destroy your pacing.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Like I said in a previous post, the unpacking-concept is interesting. It can help make the reader empathize more with the character. The drawback is that it slows down the flow of the story.

So, it's up to the writer to know when to use it and when not, as is the case with all those other "rules."



> "The schedule said the bus would come by at noon, but Mark's watch said it was already 11:57. You could see all the way down the road, as far as the Mall, and not see a bus. No doubt, the driver was parked at the turn-around, the far end of the line, taking a nap. The driver was kicked back, asleep, and Mark was going to be late. Or worse, the driver was drinking, and he'd pull up drunk and charge Mark seventy-five cents for death in a fiery traffic accident&#8230;"


Why do _*I*_ want to know all this? Unless the writer gives me a valid reason to drown in these trivial thought processes and idle conjectures, this could become extremely boring very quickly, especially if used to excess.
At least add that he's worried he's going to be late.

But, again, this could be an interesting way of telling a story. It just isn't the _only_ way.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

DCBourone said:


> Tender and loving advice from a writer who is already 'known.'
> 
> He is writing to and for a past which no longer exists.
> 
> ...


 I agree with Dalya and I agree with Chuck. But, is Dalya looking at the top 100 overall, or top 100 for genres she's interested in? Is she looking in Chuck's genre's top 100?

Good thing self-publishing lets us to do both (although perhaps under different pen names and with less money earned and more time spent on the subtle)


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## Sapphire (Apr 24, 2012)

This is advice I will consider every time my characters are thinking or wondering about something, especially when they are alone. I know I will discover places to implement his suggestions. I also know I will be confident in ignoring that same advice where I need to move quickly past the moment. The end result should be better writing, as it is in applying any of the rules.


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Andrew Ashling said:


> Why do _*I*_ want to know all this? Unless the writer gives me a valid reason to drown in these trivial thought processes and idle conjectures, this could become extremely boring very quickly, especially if used to excess.
> At least add that he's worried he's going to be late.
> 
> But, again, this could be an interesting way of telling a story. It just isn't the _only_ way.


Stephen King does it all the time and I love his writing because of it. He doesn't go on for sentences but he'll thrown in there something like "He watched the bus trundle past the post office. The driver would go on to win the Derry Fair hotdog eating contest that year and rupture his duodenum in a spectacular burst of mustard-colored vomit." Something like that.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

Quiss said:


> Stephen King does it all the time and I love his writing because of it. He doesn't go on for sentences but he'll thrown in there something like "He watched the bus trundle past the post office. The driver would go on to win the Derry Fair hotdog eating contest that year and rupture his duodenum in a spectacular burst of mustard-colored vomit." Something like that.


I agree. I think its what makes a book a book. Otherwise it may as well be: _Mark's bus was late. He missed the appointment but met a girl. They fell in love. Stuff happened. They stayed in love. The end. _


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## dianasg (Jan 8, 2010)

Mimi said:


> Was laughing too hard to finish reading opening post.
> 
> It's taken me the last year to get rid of all the terrible "training" from the "how to write to impress a literary agent/your old English prof/people who buy three books a year after they win major awards" manuals.


LOL this cracked me up!

I actually would LOVE a post where selling authors talk about all of those rules that, like this one, they've realized are useless when it comes to selling books. I've been well-indoctrinated and could use a little un-doctrination. 

ETA: I guess I should add that I agree this is great advice in moderation. I know I'm going to be looking out for places where I could expand (without overwriting).


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

The problem is that if you follow this advice, your books can become exhausting to read. I have to balance it constantly, because I'm sort of from that Chuck P school, at least philosophically. But page after page of it wears the reader out. It stops being fun to read, so you need to balance the stated desire (not to be a lazy writer) against your imperative as a genre fiction author, which is to entertain and tell your story as well as you can. It's one of those, "In theory" things I agree with, but would find myself striking through often, as I don't want my reader to get to about page 50 and go on to something more "fun" or "breezy." Which means easier to read. I find myself doing as Chuck would in my first chapters, and then quickly abandoning much of it because it's just a tougher slog than if I state my case simply and directly and get on with telling the story rather than telling the story as obliquely as possible. Which if you're always showing, believe me, you'll be doing. I personally hate the show don't tell rule, because it merely expresses certain writers' preferences, rather than a hard and fast rule to be used by everyone all the time. And in the hands of the novice writer or, god forbid, the reviewer with a semester or two of lit classes, it becomes dogma, and tedious dogma at that.


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## Redbloon (Mar 27, 2013)

A useful tool. But just that - a tool. Sometimes I use that sort of thing. In my current work in progress I have a mother trying to get to her child and being stopped at every turn. It may not make it into the final draft but I loved writing it and felt that it really upped the tension while never having to say she's worried about her child. If I jus said she felt anxious I don't think it'd work. On the other hand if she was just late for an unimportant meeting, I'd probably just say she thought she'd be late or something. 

The tools are there it is up to us as writers to decide when to use them or not.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

DianaGabriel said:


> LOL this cracked me up!
> 
> I actually would LOVE a post where selling authors talk about all of those rules that, like this one, they've realized are useless when it comes to selling books. I've been well-indoctrinated and could use a little un-doctrination.


This isn't a *publishing*(aka *selling*) "rule".(it's not even a "rule" at all) It's a *writing* exercise. Could possibly even be considered *writing* "advice". but it has nothing to do with selling.


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## Dee Ernst (Jan 10, 2011)

NathanWrann said:


> It's not possible to love words, sentences and turns-of-phrase *and* love plot, action and character? Who knew?


Of course it's possible. Most readers want both. I was a bookseller at B&N for a long time. I've talked to a lot of people about what kind of books they like to read. There are genre fiction readers, and literary fiction readers, and while they all talk about wanting great writing and a galloping plot, they pretty much read on one side of the fence or the other. Good genre writers can inject their stories with wonderful bits of writing that really satisfy their readers imagination without slowing down the story. I think that's why genre writers are commercially more successful.


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Redbloon said:


> A useful tool. But just that - a tool. Sometimes I use that sort of thing. In my current work in progress I have a mother trying to get to her child and being stopped at every turn. It may not make it into the final draft but I loved writing it and felt that it really upped the tension while never having to say she's worried about her child. If I jus said she felt anxious I don't think it'd work. On the other hand if she was just late for an unimportant meeting, I'd probably just say she thought she'd be late or something.
> 
> The tools are there it is up to us as writers to decide when to use them or not.


Exactly this. Pick your battles. Put emphasis where it does the most good.

A while ago I received a good critique on some chapters. All great except for an example of this. 
A character said "that's all they cared about". 
He wanted me to change it to "they cared about nothing else" to get rid of the "is"
But even that small change put the emphasis where I didn't want it.


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## dianasg (Jan 8, 2010)

NathanWrann said:


> This isn't a *publishing*(aka *selling*) "rule".(it's not even a "rule" at all) It's a *writing* exercise. Could possibly even be considered *writing* "advice". but it has nothing to do with selling.


Completely agree. I guess what I was taking away from the whole "Subtle is dead" thing is that the kind of "training" Dalya was referring to doesn't result in the kind of writing your average reader enjoys. I'm the kind of person who devours books on craft, believes wholeheartedly in the advice given about always using "said," avoiding adverbs, etc. But I believe that if I want not only to sell, but also to make myself a stronger _storyteller_, there are possibly some things I could stand to "unlearn." But you are right - the OP is not about selling or storytelling. It's about writing, and it's good advice in moderation.

Sometimes the attitude of "I've published, I know everything there is to know about writing" I see on KB makes me cringe; on the other hand, I think its refreshing - coming from the world of academia and literary writing - to see some authors bucking the "rules," and still telling great stories and having success. For me, it's about achieving a balance between being a good writer and being a good storyteller, and not nurturing one skill at the expense of the other.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Quiss said:


> Stephen King does it all the time and I love his writing because of it. He doesn't go on for sentences but he'll thrown in there something like "He watched the bus trundle past the post office. The driver would go on to win the Derry Fair hotdog eating contest that year and rupture his duodenum in a spectacular burst of mustard-colored vomit." Something like that.


Yes, I do that too. A lot.

Except here the author wants it to be a better substitute for "Waiting for the bus, Mark started to worry about how long the trip would take&#8230;"
This fragment doesn't convey that. What it tells me is that the MC has some issues and thinks that a bus being five minutes late means he will die a horrible death.

Besides, "King does it all the time" is an argumentum ad auctoritatum. While I confess doing it too, maybe not everyone wants to write like that.

Anyway, I think I stated already - a few times - that it is quite interesting advice, but not a universal, eternal, use-under-any-and-all-circumstances rule.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

DCBourone said:


> Tender and loving advice from a writer who is already 'known.'
> 
> He is writing to and for a past which no longer exists.
> 
> ...


No it's not. There have always been readers who like to read subtle writing and readers who prefer to be beaten over the head with writing. Nothing has changed and nothing is dead. The latter has always been more popular than the former.

If you like to write subtly, then write for your readers. They're out there. There aren't as many of them as there are readers who don't enjoy subtlety, but that has always been the case.


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## Tony Bertauski (May 18, 2012)

Reading an accomplished writer 'show don't tell' is like watching the IT guy fix your computer. 

He sure made that look easy.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

I get this as an artistic thing and a great way to arbitrarily up your word count come NaNoWriMo, but... I write stories _about_ characters, not stories with characters in.

The thing is, sometimes they think. Sometimes they wonder, daydream or idly speculate. Sometimes the deduce or know things or take things as a given. They are people. People who exist in digital ink, but still people and part of their sole is that they do all these things just like we of the flesh and bone do.

I can understand that sometimes just having things known out of the blue is bad. I do go back and ask 'why do they think this?' and sometimes expand, but I feel that it guts some of the experience of the characters to completely obscure their thoughts with clouds of words.

This is good advice for a style of writing, but not something everyone should do.

Also, the 'Gwen' example *doesn't tell the reader anything*. Maybe it is clear for the writer, but you know what? I have been in the shoes of the 'Adam' character, saw everything he saw and _I still didn't know the person liked me_.


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## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

At the very least, his advice was excellent for a traditional / epic fantasy author. Too often, I find myself wanting to write something along the lines of: "He knew that she was skilled with a sword." When you're creating a completely new world while also telling a story, that can lead to some really lazy writing. 

It's much better in the long run to write: "With each fluid movement, sword and fighter seemed as one. It was an ancient blade, carrying the markings of her house; the warrior's skill was no less than any of her fallen ancestors."

Yeah, that's kind of a weak sentence. I know. I just woke up, so cut me a little slack (pretty please?). It still gets my point across. I'd much rather read the second line than the first one in a story. Still, it's perfectly fine to break any rules you want. It's also great to continue learning as we go.


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## sbaum4853 (May 3, 2010)

I adore Chucky P and back in the day I studied essays like this before every writing session. Nine years ago I sent him fan mail and he mailed back a handwritten response and a signed Fight Club paperback with a hysterical inscription written in goofy blue marker. In my mind, this guy can do no wrong.

I enjoy books whose authors have worked hard to 'unpack' their thoughts as described in this article, and I used to be a snoot who considered Chuck Palahniuk and my other faves to be "good writers" as opposed to writers like Cassandra Clare and James Patterson whose style is just the opposite of what's promoted in this piece. 

Putting my work out there, seeing reader reactions, and reading widely in multiple genres has humbled me about all of this. Rather than think about what is 'good' writing and what isn't, it's more productive to focus on what kind of writing you like. This article is very useful if you like Palahniuk.


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## DCBourone (Sep 10, 2012)

Elhawk, understood.

Some continuing body of readers will look for 'literature'--whatever that may be.

But the broad brush of Dalya's comment re. subtlety seemed to properly trace
the arc from Dickens, to let's say, Brad Thor.

In the most successful genre fiction, it seems that subtle might be a serious disadvantage.


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## dalya (Jul 26, 2011)

Nobody would even know who the hell Chuck Palahnuk is if his story hadn't been made into a popular movie starring sexy Brad Pitt.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

I think it's a mistake to assume using "thought" verbs will improve pacing and that "unpacking" will bog it down.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

Mimi said:


> Nobody would even know who the hell Chuck Palahnuk is if his story hadn't been made into a popular movie starring sexy Brad Pitt.


His mother would probably know who he is.


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## dalya (Jul 26, 2011)

NathanWrann said:


> His mother would probably know who he is.


YO MAMMA ...


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## rainvilleadam (Jan 9, 2013)

Bards and Sages - 1
Dayla - 0


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## KaryE (May 12, 2012)

Thanks to Scarlett for posting this.    The advice suits my style well (I've been called subtle before). I'll give it a whirl and see what I think.


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## dalya (Jul 26, 2011)

rainvilleadam said:


> Bards and Sages - 1
> Dayla - 0


HAHAHAH

Rating people who are contributing - 0


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Mimi said:


> HAHAHAH
> 
> Rating people who are contributing - 0


This.
After all,


> YO MAMMA ...


 trumps everything.


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## Al Dente (Sep 3, 2012)

I see wisdom on both sides of the fence in this discussion. No need for scorecards.


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## J. Tanner (Aug 22, 2011)

NathanWrann said:


> I think it's a mistake to assume using "thought" verbs will improve pacing and that "unpacking" will bog it down.


This.

Chuck is talking about learning to use sensory detail as the default (but not only, if you have a good reason otherwise) method of conveying thoughts. Very typical "show, don't tell" style advice. He tends to practice what he preaches and his novels are the shortest on my shelf--though, granted, they may not be as plot heavy as some others. His pacing is fine. It doesn't tend to be too hard to find areas far better than sensory detail to trim if things are moving too slowly.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

NathanWrann said:


> I think it's a mistake to assume using "thought" verbs will improve pacing and that "unpacking" will bog it down.


The example provided didn't help the case though. That was seriously a lot of words to fail at conveying an idea.


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## rainvilleadam (Jan 9, 2013)

It is kind of strange that the examples he uses are a little long, but I think he was just trying to get his point across in the absence of context, so he had to use an extra long "thought." After all, most of the essays he's written about writing, he preaches the minimalist approach to writing. 
From his Wikipedia page: "In what the author refers to as a minimalistic  approach, his writings include a limited vocabulary and short sentences to mimic the way that an average person telling a story would speak."

That was contributing, not laughing at a successful author trying to share legitimate advice or speculating on his success.


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## Mike McIntyre (Jan 19, 2011)

NathanWrann said:


> I think it's a mistake to assume using "thought" verbs will improve pacing and that "unpacking" will bog it down.


I agree. 
Also, most of his novels run 250 to 275 pages. Following his advice need not result in doorstops.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

NathanWrann said:


> I think it's a mistake to assume using "thought" verbs will improve pacing and that "unpacking" will bog it down.


Did anyone say that?



Mike McIntyre said:


> I agree.
> Also, most of his novels run 250 to 275 pages. Following his advice need not result in doorstops.


Still quite long for a short story.


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## LinaG (Jun 18, 2012)

This:



> Off the top of my head, I'd say that when you clobber the reader over the head with "this character thinks precisely this about that" then reader interactivity with the text is reduced. If you instead provided the details suggestive of what the character thinks, then the reader can determine for his/her self the exact thought or the degree of feeling, the reader can in a sense write the novel as a coauthor. That sounds more fun to me as a reader, more immersive too. And perhaps it's more reflective of reality in that we don't ever really know exactly what other people are thinking.


I had a rhetoric course in High School that taught us to write this way. It was useful to learn, taught you to think in a detail oriented way when writing fiction. I do think that the style must mesh with the work as to what level of "wordiness" is acceptable.



> I have been in the shoes of the 'Adam' character, saw everything he saw and I still didn't know the person liked me.


 Exactly! In this case, the reader will know more than the Adam character = reader engagement, and creates a fun knowledge gap for the writer to play with.

I think it's good to know how to build sentences like these so that you can pare them down and get the best of both worlds: meaningful detail that says more by saying less.

Li


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

DCBourone said:


> Elhawk, understood.
> 
> Some continuing body of readers will look for 'literature'--whatever that may be.
> 
> ...


well, that's the thing. We're always so quick to assume that there was ever a time when LITERATURE in all-caps with a booming announcer voice was the best-selling or most popular or even the ONLY stuff out there. It never, ever was. The same exact stuff we see selling the most today -- "beach read" style, easy-to-digest stories, or thrilling stories full of action, or sexy or otherwise lurid stories -- have always, always, always been the most popular sellers. And I doubt there was ever a time when such stories were written for an audience that appreciated subtlety. The readers who don't give a rip about subtlety and just want a good time have always dramatically outnumbered the readers who do.

So I don't think there's ever been any "arc" or progression from some Point A of subtlety and high literary quality (representing the majority of what sold to readers) to some kind of seamy degradation that we allegedly see today. This has always been the proportion of what readers and writers prefer to consume and to make. The audience for quiet, introspective, literary work has always been relatively tiny...because quiet introspection and/or art-appreciation has never been the most popular reason for picking up a book. It's typically just easy, enjoyable entertainment that readers want.

How do I know this has always been the case? There are multiple copies of popular ancient Egyptian novels (mostly surviving in fragments, but still obviously the same stories) while there are relatively few examples of beautiful poetry, philosophy, or thoughtful personal musings. And there's even more dirty graffiti. Even the Pharaohs just wanted to read some Brad Thor, for the most part.

ETA: Plus, you guys, I think lots of you are taking Palahniuk's article kind of personally. There's no need. As somebody already pointed out, he wrote it to help people who are looking for ways to improve their writing. Being conscious of how often you tell versus show is one way to improve your writing. Should you abandon telling all the time? Of course not. But he's not proposing that: he's proposing abandoning it for six months in order to make yourself aware of how often you do it. For people who are looking for improvements. If you're not looking for improvements at this time, or in this area of your writing, then he's not even talking to you. So I hardly see the need to get all defensive and nit-picky over what he wrote.


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## bhazelgrove (Jul 16, 2013)

Show don't tell...no truer words ever spoken. Go Chuck


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

LinaG said:


> Exactly! In this case, the reader will know more than the Adam character = reader engagement, and creates a fun knowledge gap for the writer to play with.


Which would be great if that was what he was trying to do. However, that passage was supposed to tell us that Adam knows Gwen likes him--and does nothing of the sort.

Once again, it's one of those art vs entertainment deals, but if your intention is to convey the information that Adam knows Gwen likes him with no ambiguity and there is no reason or even a good reason not to obfuscate it, then that was a bad way of doing it.

If you're trying to make it discrete, then sure, go for it. But if you're trying to convey information, why bend over backward to cloak it in ambiguity? What if it is important to my story that Adam knows Gwen likes him? What if things hinge and turn on the fact?

Time and place is the thing. You can't just blanket ban this stuff because you like the other way better.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

ElHawk said:


> So I hardly see the need to get all defensive and nit-picky over what he wrote.


I don't think a lot of us are defensive over what he wrote. Nit-picky&#8230; that's another matter. Picking theories about writing apart - and finding out what agrees with you or not, and why - is one way to improve.

I find the more nit-pickying posts the most interesting.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

Now that I stop and think about it, my problem with this is that it puts everything on the narrator.

I don't particularly like it when the narrator is the sole source of information from a reader standpoint. It feels better to me when the narrator gives me world information and the character gives me character information.

I think removing 'thought' words removes the reader's access to the character's thoughts and opinions and thus separates them from the character. So despite my pounding on that (horrible) example, that is the real problem I'm having with this. I care way more about characters than narrative voice.


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## Zoe York (May 12, 2013)

And I would say the opposite - removing the word "think" gets you closer to the character's POV.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Vaalingrade said:


> Now that I stop and think about it, my problem with this is that it puts everything on the narrator.
> 
> I don't particularly like it when the narrator is the sole source of information from a reader standpoint. It feels better to me when the narrator gives me world information and the character gives me character information.
> 
> I think removing 'thought' words removes the reader's access to the character's thoughts and opinions and thus separates them from the character. So despite my pounding on that (horrible) example, that is the real problem I'm having with this. I care way more about characters than narrative voice.


Yes. I think that is one of the things that bug me too.


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## J. Tanner (Aug 22, 2011)

Vaalingrade said:


> I think removing 'thought' words removes the reader's access to the character's thoughts and opinions and thus separates them from the character. So despite my pounding on that (horrible) example, that is the real problem I'm having with this. I care way more about characters than narrative voice.


I don't get that at all from what Chuck is saying.

"John knew Mary liked him."

How? No clue. We just have to accept it. No sensory detail.

You may quibble about the effectiveness of the details Chuck chose in his example but he's chosen specific details that convey exactly why John thinks Mary likes him.

In either case, John could be wrong, but you have a tangible detail to work with, to interpret.

In both cases, we're still entirely within the character of John and no more or less burden is on the character vs the narrator.

And while Chuck has chosen a detail that you perhaps find too subtle, there's no requirement to use a subtle detail. John could find a slip of paper with J+M slipped into his locker every morning if you prefer--it still solve the problem by showing a tangible detail vs telling a piece of dry information with little or no narrative evidence of it.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

J. Tanner said:


> I don't get that at all from what Chuck is saying.
> 
> "John knew Mary liked him."
> 
> ...


My problem is more that this case still kind of requires the 'thought' word if that piece of information is important.

You are absolutely right to ask 'how?' though and there is where I would add all those words he put in place of it. I think removing the 'knew' removes the reason you write the rest of it if you assume that having the audience know that Adam knows this is the important bit.

The replacement in that case changes the whole meaning of the sentence from telling the audience that 'this is a thing that Adam knows' to 'this is a thing that you (the reader) can infer, but you still have no idea if Adam knows or not.

But I'm getting away from myself here. The problem I have is that Adam is no longer involved in that passage.


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## J. Tanner (Aug 22, 2011)

Vaalingrade said:


> The problem I have is that Adam is no longer involved in that passage.


I see what you're getting at. While it's not obvious from a snippet example, the assumption is that this is in limited 3rd person and the entire story/passage/novel is from John's POV. The knowing is always assumed as is the seeing in "Mary kissed Doug" vs "I saw Mary Kiss Doug" and the hearing in "A bee buzzed by" vs "I heard a bee buzz by" and so on.

Chuck has another essay somewhere about the weakness of "He saw/heard/felt..." and the "He knew/wondered/thought..." essay here appears to me to just be an extension of that _show, don't tell _ deepening of POV immersive detail.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

zoeyork said:


> And I would say the opposite - removing the word "think" gets you closer to the character's POV.


I agree with this. I get the impression that the less...hmmm...how to describe it? Distanced? Yeah, I think that's the word. The less distanced you can be with narration, the more immediate and emotional and present it feels. He thought, she wondered, he worried, etc. all just put so much distance between the reader and the character. Not sure why that should be, but that's the way it feels to me. Probably somebody with an actual education knows precisely why it feels this way and can explain it in technical terms. I can't. 

I have noticed that first-person narratives tend to suffer more from too much tell and not enough show...at least in my reading experience. I wonder whether the folks who _want _to create a more intimate and personal narrative by using first person might be falling short of the mark by assuming that first person is all they need to achieve that...and then allow too high a proportion of "think" words in, which just makes it feel so distant.

Food for thought, I guess.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

J. Tanner said:


> I see what you're getting at. While it's not obvious from a snippet example, the assumption is that this is in limited 3rd person and the entire story/passage/novel is from John's POV.


Okay, now I get what he's trying to do. I guess it works pretty well for that and 1st person. Still not by bag, but now I understand what's being done and why.


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## TexasGirl (Dec 21, 2011)

The last few posts are hitting on something important here. I was thinking about Chuck's post when I reopened my current WIP and came across this bit:



> I unhooked the battery, still watching Mario in my peripheral vision. He pranced around the garage bay, pulling off the rags like it was a scarf dance. I wanted to tell him this girl was for real, but I didn't feel like sharing Corabelle, not even to talk about.


Now that last sentence seemed to be what Chuck was talking about. But as I tried to "unpack" it, to describe Gavin avoiding conversation about his girlfriend, I realized, this isn't how Gavin would say it/think it. He'd be simple.

So an important part of this picture, and why you should listen to Chuck but not actually implement his idea whole hog for six months (some of us will write two or three novels in that amount of time), is _voice_. Our character's voice dictates the level of "unpacking" as well as the pacing, which might require shorthand to get us from A to B quickly, not leisurely.


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

TexasGirl said:


> So an important part of this picture, and why you should listen to Chuck but not actually implement his idea whole hog for six months (some of us will write two or three novels in that amount of time), is _voice_. Our character's voice dictates the level of "unpacking" as well as the pacing, which might require shorthand to get us from A to B quickly, not leisurely.


Well, the character dictates only in the case of third person limited in which there is no distance between the narrator's and character's voice.

A point that hasn't been raised in this thread yet, I don't think, is that "unpacking" takes time to do well. Those who write two or three novels in six months aren't doing much of it, unless freakishly gifted. To use my own genre as an example, Chuck P seems to be advocating for Dennis Lehane over Harlan Coben. These days Lehane does a lot of "unpacking" and often takes years between books, whereas Coben puts out one book a year quite reliably. It's a different kind of writing for a different audience, by and large.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

Interesting topic.  I often find that in trying to stay in a character's head, I convey too much information.  For instance, the quote above where one character watches another character from his peripheral vision.  Is that needed?  Doesn't the reader assume that if we describe one character doing something that implies the main character is watching it?  These are the little things that I cut out on the second and third passes.  I try to catch all of them before handing off to beta readers.

Reading the prose ALOUD really helps catch this stuff.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

TexasGirl said:


> Our character's voice dictates the level of "unpacking" as well as the pacing, which might require shorthand to get us from A to B quickly, not leisurely.


Yes, definitely! And I think the example you posted is fully "unpacked." The character's observations are all there; the experience of being in the scene is there; it feels very "present." "I wanted to tell him...but" doesn't feel like it needs any unpacking, because you've illustrated the character's experience very well in the preceding sentences.

I think it's when you start paragraphs with "I wanted," or "I thought," or "I felt," and then proceed to illustrate the point (or worse, don't illustrate at all) that it feels like it needs unpacking.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Eric C said:


> Well, the character dictates only in the case of third person limited in which there is no distance between the narrator's and character's voice.
> 
> A point that hasn't been raised in this thread yet, I don't think, is that "unpacking" takes time to do well. Those who write two or three novels in six months aren't doing much of it, unless freakishly gifted. To use my own genre as an example, Chuck P seems to be advocating for Dennis Lehane over Harlan Coben. These days Lehane does a lot of "unpacking" and often takes years between books, whereas Coben puts out one book a year quite reliably. It's a different kind of writing for a different audience, by and large.


I think like any other aspect of writing, it's a skill that becomes easier to utilize the more one practices with it. I think I do a reasonably good job of writing "unpacked" prose most of the time, and I recently wrote a novel in three weeks that's doing very well with reader reviews. I think training your brain to see and communicate scenes in more unpacked terms could take some time, but once you've done the training (which is what the six-month suggestion is meant to be, I think: training), it's a skill that's easy to deploy.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

Deke said:


> Interesting topic. I often find that in trying to stay in a character's head, I convey too much information. For instance, the quote above where one character watches another character from his peripheral vision. Is that needed? Doesn't the reader assume that if we describe one character doing something that implies the main character is watching it? These are the little things that I cut out on the second and third passes. I try to catch all of them before handing off to beta readers.
> 
> Reading the prose ALOUD really helps catch this stuff.


The character/narrator is doing two things. Unhooking the battery and watching Mario. It might be necessary to convey to the reader that the narrator (Gavin) is discretely watching Mario (out of peripheral vision) while doing the other thing. So I don't think it's unnecessary in this example to omit the watching verb.


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## J. Tanner (Aug 22, 2011)

TexasGirl said:


> The last few posts are hitting on something important here. I was thinking about Chuck's post when I reopened my current WIP and came across this bit:
> 
> Now that last sentence seemed to be what Chuck was talking about. But as I tried to "unpack" it, to describe Gavin avoiding conversation about his girlfriend, I realized, this isn't how Gavin would say it/think it. He'd be simple.
> 
> So an important part of this picture, and why you should listen to Chuck but not actually implement his idea whole hog for six months (some of us will write two or three novels in that amount of time), is _voice_. Our character's voice dictates the level of "unpacking" as well as the pacing, which might require shorthand to get us from A to B quickly, not leisurely.


Couldn't you "unpack" it like so while reducing the word count and maintaining the simplicity of the voice?

_I unhooked the battery. Mario pranced around the garage bay, pulling off the rags like it was a scarf dance. Tell him about Corabelle or not? Definitely not. Not yet._

The "I wanted" and "I didn't feel like" distancers (for lack of a better/real word) from the character are gone while maintaining the simple summary style.


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## pauldude000 (May 22, 2013)

Sheila_Guthrie said:


> To a certain degree, I agree with this advice. But as Joe and others have noted, it doesn't always work. Honestly, some of the examples were a bit overboard.
> 
> Still, must strive to apply this to my work."(. . .) specific sensory detail: action, smell, taste, sound, and feeling."


I am going to speak as a reader/collector, and not as an Author. I have owned thousands of paperbacks over the years, many of which I read, and then re-read until they were worn out and dog eared.

Every once in a great while I would weed out my collection to make space for new titles. It was not until after I became an author that I even realized what I was weeding out, and why.

The first books to hit the door would always be "show don't tell". They were marginally enjoyable, disjointed, and though quality enough to have made the collection, were the least enjoyable.

The second type which quickly followed were the "tell no show". This group had too much extraneous garbage, and somehow "felt" shallow.

The third type, which were usually the books that remained in my collection, were generally "Show AND tell". They were deep, enjoyable, well paced, and sucked me into the world and characters created by the author.

"Show don't tell" never did that for me, and "Tell no show" never fully accomplished the task either. Do not get me wrong. Every book in my collection was the cream of the crop. I never kept a book just because I bought it. To make it into my collection, a book had to be good.

My point is that your statement is highly astute. The best works, from what I have seen, are a balanced blend... a mixture of logic, thought, emotion, and vibrant sensory description set at a pace which keeps the reader hooked.


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## TexasGirl (Dec 21, 2011)

There's some brilliant people in this thread!

I'm lookin' at you NathanWrann and J. Tanner!


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

ElHawk said:


> I think like any other aspect of writing, it's a skill that becomes easier to utilize the more one practices with it. I think I do a reasonably good job of writing "unpacked" prose most of the time, and I recently wrote a novel in three weeks that's doing very well with reader reviews. I think training your brain to see and communicate scenes in more unpacked terms could take some time, but once you've done the training (which is what the six-month suggestion is meant to be, I think: training), it's a skill that's easy to deploy.


A novel in three weeks that's "unpacked?" Sounds as though you're very gifted to me. But I think that for many there's a significant difference in time and effort between coming up with the first word that works (e.g., the "thought" words Chuck P's exercise outlaws) and the almost right word, much less the right word (to allude to Twain's "lightning and the lightning bug" saying).

For example, I remember a short paragraph from Nabokov's Lolita in which Humbert Humbert opens up the refrigerator of his wife (whom he'd married only to get closer to Lolita) and finds its contents "puritan" so he goes out and buys some rich foods. I think the choice of "puritan" to describe the contents of the refrigerator was Twainian lightning, just the right word, if you know Humbert's character, not to mention the themes of the novel, and I wonder how long it took Nabokov to come up with it. Perhaps he got lucky and it was quick, or perhaps he had to stew on it for twenty minutes, or pull it off on the fifth rewrite, but almost surely it took him longer than if the description of the refrigerator's contents had been perfectly straightforward in his mind. And he struck lightning on page after page of that book, and it took him years to write that novel. (I just looked it up, and Nabokov's previous novel had appeared eight years before, and he hadn't published any short story collections in the meantime; albeit, he was a professor at the time; but still, eight years!)


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## valeriec80 (Feb 24, 2011)

So, today, during one of my breaks, I was writing the next scene in my head as I am wont to do, and my narrator said, "Suddenly, I was angry." 

Immediately, I thought of this thread.

By the time I sat down to the keyboard, my narrator was not telling the audience how he felt, but instead punching a tree over and over until his knuckles bled.

Scene's way more visceral, and describing the action conveyed heaps more than anger. It conveyed frustration and helplessness and self-destructiveness and a bunch of junk.

So thanks for this. Love Mr. Chuck, BTW.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

Eric C, I don't necessarily disagree with your point but I don't think that we can correlate perceived quality with time. For all we know Nabokov could have written Lolita in a week and trunked it for eight years. Or maybe "Puritan" was his editor's choice. I do like the "lightning" word concept (ill have to look it up to see what Twain says about it) and it reminds me of a novel by Stewart O'Nan where he describes the shadows made by moonlight through barren trees as "black lace" it's a perfect description and its only 9 letters. I think that what you're saying is relevant to this conversation in that (I believe) very rarely is the "thought" word the right choice, or the Twainian lightning.


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## Joe_Nobody (Oct 23, 2012)

I forget the book... I hate it when I do that. The line, however, has stuck with me for years.

"The night was casket black..."

Perfect... just friggin perfect.


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

NathanWrann said:


> Eric C, I don't necessarily disagree with your point but I don't think that we can correlate perceived quality with time...


Well, if we're speaking about all authors then I'd agree the correlation would be low given some authors are simply more facile than others. But if you focus on an individual author then I think the correlation is strong. If you've been writing "packed" novels and then switch to "unpacked" it's going to take you longer, particularly at first, because there is an extra step involved, often a transmutation from abstract language to implicative, concrete detail.


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

Joe_Nobody said:


> I forget the book... I hate it when I do that. The line, however, has stuck with me for years.
> 
> "The night was casket black..."
> 
> Perfect... just friggin perfect.


"The nights were blinding cold and casket black and the long reach of the morning had a terrible silence to it." Cormac McCarthy, The Road. (Had to Google it, but it sounded familiar to me too, and I've read The Road. The dude has chops!)


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## FMH (May 18, 2013)

Spawning heated debate, the topic prodded their sensibilities and beliefs,  in varying degrees and directions. When all was said and done, and mud had been slung and people congratulated, they agreed - sometimes rules are made to be broken.

She thought.


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## FMH (May 18, 2013)

F.M.Hopkins said:


> Spawning heated debate, the topic prodded their sensibilities and beliefs, in varying degrees and directions. When all was said and done, and mud had been slung and people congratulated, they agreed - sometimes rules are made to be broken.
> 
> ...she thought.


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## NathanWrann (May 5, 2011)

valeriec80 said:


> So, today, during one of my breaks, I was writing the next scene in my head as I am wont to do, and my narrator said, "Suddenly, I was angry."
> 
> Immediately, I thought of this thread.
> 
> ...


Excellent example. This beautifully illustrates one of the benefits of what Chuck was talking about. You get a much more visceral scene.

And, you are far more likely to get a reaction from a reader along the lines of "Man, when he started punching the tree, I could feel it. I've been there. I felt his pain." because of the unpacked section.

I've never heard someone describe a book and say "My favorite part of the book was when the narrator said "I was so angry"." Readers aren't going to react to thought words. Plain and simple.


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