Let the reader have an imagination

One of the usual mistakes beginners make is to explain too much.

How much is too much? You need to learn what is necessary for the story. These come with experience, but a beginner can start developing them by recognizing the problem.

The problem is love. You love your story. You love your characters. You love the world you've invented. You want your readers to see them, appreciate them, and understand them just as you do yourself. And since you don't want your readers to start with the wrong impression, you pile up descriptive scenes as soon as the story opens. Or you drop in a big lump of description right after that 'grabber' first line you know you're supposed to have, in order to steer the reader into your vision.

For instance:

    The car plunged through the barrier and over the cliff.
    Nadine prayed the airbag would save her, her generous mouth opened in a scream, her periwinkle blue eyes fixed in horror on the ocean below, her auburn hair, thick and luxuriant, streaming behind her, her elegant, long legs braced for the crash.
    Nadine had always been strikingly beautiful, even as a child. Her hair, less golden then, was always held back by a blue ribbon. In summer a few delicious freckles dusted her nose. Wide shoulders had led, in adolescence, to a bosom of graceful proportions. Her hands were elegant and beauticians often commented on her healthy nails, nails that were now digging into the car's upholstery....

and so on.

How can we avoid this mistake? Rewrite your work, excluding every scrap of description. Now how does the story read? If a detail was not necessary, its absence will not be noticed. You'll be surprised how little description you actually need.

Use action to describe.

From Careless in Red by Elizabeth George

Use dialog to describe. (In the example below, we know their are trees, a fence, markers and in clear view of a house.)

From One Last Breath by Stephen Booth

A basic rule of writing: don't add anything that does not propel the story. Two people rushing through the night to the hospital is action, two people arguing in the car as they rush to the hospital is character development within action. The fact that one of them is six foot tall with blue eyes is neither action nor illumination.

Advice for beginners: cut. And keep cutting until you think you have reduced your story to a skeleton. The skeleton is your story. The rest is blubber.

Source: here 

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Check out Corra's blog about characters today!

Elevate Awareness to Elevate Description Skills

E.yeball
L.isten
E.mbellish
V.isualize
A.bsorb
T.ake Notes
E.xplore Possibilities

The picture is by: Escher (one of my favorites)

If you take notice of your surroundings, you will become a better writer. This sounds obvious. SO how do we go about doing this?

Use the 7 principles listed above:

1. E.yeball - Open your eyes, we may see a setting hundreds of times but now, try and find three things in those settings you've not noticed before. Touch. Taste. Listen. Tone your awareness muscles by exercising them.
2. L.isten - Be a better listener. You may be sitting in a quiet room but is it really? Listen for even the smallest noise. Is your computer fan running? Tap dripping? Dog breathing? Clock ticking? If you're in a loud room, try to distinguish sounds. Loud music - what instruments are playing? Tune in to specific voices and conversations.
3. E.mbellish - Turn your mundane surroundings into prize-winning novels. Don't accept what happens around us as random and unmotivated. For instance, if you encounter a noise or occurrence that is not easily explained, don't dismiss it, try to find an explanation or create one. Noise in the attic? Perhaps a homeless person in the neighborhood has made the attic his home.
4. V.isualize - Shut your eyes to see better. How cold is the air? How hard is the ground? What places on your body aches or itches? Try to locate them.
5. A.bsorb - Look for shapes and patterns in everything. What do the clouds look like? Patterns in he stars, do you see them? Patterns in houses and pages and fields. Deviate from your routine for five minutes. Walk to the store instead of drive. Read a book in the rain. Eat breakfast for dinner.
6. T.ake Notes - Write these ideas down.
   
7. E.xplore Possibilities - Make the above actions a habit. Try it for three weeks. 

Exercises:
1) When watching television, look everywhere on the screen except where the director wants you to look. What do you notice? Do you notice furniture in the backgrounds? What books do they read? What time is it on their clock? How do commercials get you to focus on the products?
2) Keep an awareness journal for a week. Write your observations down.
3) Practice looking. How many tulips did you count this month? Roses? Red colored cars?
4) Make it your goal to be creative all day long.

Taken from the book:
Source: Brainstormer