Show Don't Tell

By frank mora

A picture is worth a thousand words, but so much more when the picture is an abstract one instead of a description with no wiggle room. That wiggle room is the gap that keeps readers engaged in your story. This book will show you a way to keep your book fresh, intriguing, and most important of all not boring! By bringing together internal, and external voices in combination with beats you will not recognize your story afterwards.

• Language: English
• Publisher: frank mora
• Release date: Jan 1, 2014

Book preview

SHOW DON’T TELL

BY FRANK MORA

TEXT COPYRIGHT 2013, © FRANK MORA

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

BORING BOOKS

ENGAGING YOUR READER

PRINCIPLES

INTERNAL VOICE

EXTERNAL VOICE

ACTIONS

USING ALL THREE

TAGGING

BEATS

ADVERBS

GRAMMAR

PAINTING A PICTURE

TYPES OF DESCRIPTION

LOCATION

CHARACTER

ACTION

THE CAMERA TEST

EMOTION

THANK YOU

INTRODUCTION

If you do nothing else other than follow these principles, you will succeed in lifting your novel to the next level.

In this section, we will go one step further and look at dialogue in more detail.

You will learn how to write dialogue that is crisp and realistic.

You will also discover how to control your dialogue, so the reader remains engaged, whilst fleshing out your character’s personality.

We will discover new techniques that will help you to stay on the Show, Don’t Tell straight and narrow, learning tricks that will force you to kill TELL at conception.

We will even delve into the basic grammar of dialogue. Finally, we will consider thoughts and their role, if any, in the Show, Don’t Tell methodology.

BORING BOOKS

Did you know that just under half the people who start reading a book will not get past the first 100 pages? In fact, only 38% of readers say they will read a book to the end, no matter what.

This is shocking!

According to these statistics even the best book in the world can expect about 60% of its readers never to finish reading it.

So what make a reader stop reading?

Well, some of the obvious candidates play a role. Readers suggest that the dislike of the main character plays a role, as does weak writing and a poor plot. However, there is one reason, far beyond any other, that stops people reading.

The main factor making the reader stop doing what they love, was that they found the book BORING!

This is a dagger through a writer’s heart. After all, how can a reader find your story boring? You’ve sweated blood over the plot, thought for countless hours about characters and even written out painstaking back story for your world and its inhabitants.

Well here’s a secret.

It’s actually your fault! Yes, don’t make that face at me! It’s your duty as a writer to not be boring.

However, this is easier said than done.

Perhaps the best way to understand why readers find the book boring is to look at the art of writing from a new perspective. You see it may not be that your story is boring. It is much more likely that the technique you are using to tell your story is intrinsically boring.

A book consists of two key elements:

The first element is story.

The second element is the way in which the story is told.

In short, being a storyteller and being a writer are two different things.

If you are a great storyteller, but a poor technical writer you will produce boring novels. On the flip side, if you are a poor storyteller, but a great technical writer you will also produce a boring novel. Remember our definition of boring is a book a reader fails to finish.

If you are to produce a novel that will engage and inspire a reader, you need skills in both storytelling and story writing.

Now for the good, and bad news.

The bad news first. Storytellers are born, not taught. Being able to tell a good story is something in our bones, our DNA. If you can’t tell a good story then stop reading now I am wasting your time; however, the chances are that if you are even considering writing a book then you have the storytelling bug.

You can’t teach someone to know how to use words effectively and beautifully. You can help people who can write to write more efficiently, and you can probably teach people a lot of little tips for writing a novel, but I don’t think somebody who cannot write and does not care for words. People with those bullheaded traits can never be made into a writer. It just is not possible.

The good news is that good writing can be taught.

In fact, unless you have been shown how to write in a way that will engage your reader, then you will be thirsty in the desert. We all have some instinct, or latent knowledge that we have picked up by reading good novels, however, without understanding the principles behind the writing techniques; you will be flying blind.

Now… time for a little honesty.

There are lots of ways to write novels, though the basic principles remain the same. For years editors and writers have been arguing over the best practices. Some suggest that large amounts of description are essential; others that anything other than the most basic description