You might not be able to tell so far from this series, but I’ve actually long been a proponent of the “less is more” school of writing, especially when it comes to emotion. Unfortunately, as I’ve learned the hard way, sometimes less is just less. Not enough.
Different readers like different styles, and expectations vary by genre. But, handled well, emotion can enhance any dramatic scene. Sometimes we do need to avoid putting too much emotion in to give the reader room to feel, 
too. Other times, it’s more important to show the reader that the character cares and struggles, so they should, too.
I think we’re all used to seeing the sin of too much emotion in writing. But not enough emotion is probably just as common a problem, and even trickier to diagnose. It’s good—vital, even—to leave room for our readers to feel, too, and to avoid melodrama. But if our characters don’t feel anything on the page, the readers are left to wonder whether they are supposed to fill in all the blanks (and if so, how, exactly?), or whether they’re just blanks.
Writing “she felt sad” or “he was scared” isn’t going to cut it. We want our readers to feel what our characters feel, and characters—people—experience emotion physically.
Our emotions engage our bodies. Even emotional clichés convey this: we see red, our blood boils, we get butterflies in our stomach. To get to our readers’ emotions, we do need to go through our characters’ emotions. As I’ve said before, we want our readers to experience these emotions right along with our characters. Techniques like figurative language from last week, when focused on physical reactions to emotions, almost bypass a reader’s thoughts, evoking similar physical responses from the reader. That’s why they’re so powerful—and why we have to be careful to use them judiciously.
We still have to be careful to make sure we don’t overdo it—we’ll be talking more about that this week—but at the least, I think we need a little physical response to the emotional stimulus in any scene where we want the readers to know this matters to our character (and, by extension, them).
What do you think? How do you convey physical emotion?
Photo by René van Belzen
This is a really nice blog. It’s nice to meet a fellow mystery/romance writer. I agree with you about the emotions. We need to find a balance, not too much and not too little. Myself, I tend to fall short.
You are right. The key is to to write a visual that comes across naturally. Spoon-feeding the reader is running the risk of sounding condenscending.
Thanks for the great blog.
Great post Jordan! I sometimes am guilty of putting in too little emotion rather than be melodramatic. My favorite way to convey emotion is through the surroundings. A few sentences can help build a scene and establish an emotional climate without having to ever state outright what a character is feeling.
I’ve got an interesting problem right now – I’m trying to get way, way LESS, i.e. stripping out unnecessary wordage…and suddenly people are telling me I’ve got too little. 😀 So yeah, I’m going from one extreme to the other & now I have to find a happy medium.
Intriguing post, and something I’ve never really thought about. I *never* allow myself to use the words “s/he felt” or “I felt,” and I severely restrict my use of “was.” This forces me to convey emotion physically. Of course, how much is always dependent on flow and pace. A fast paced scene might require a quick ‘tell’ to keep the story moving, while a quiet introspective scene could mean paragraphs of emotive physical action interspersed with inner thoughts.
Oh, those are great points! I find myself using quick tells occasionally to keep pacing up, too.
Thanks, Jordan. You gave me something good to think about. Maybe when I first choose a character I should first choose what emotions I want her to feel. Never thought of it that way before. : )
Yes! Definitely for me more is not enough.
I’m realizing that I need to border on “over-the-top-melodramatic” to be “enough”.
The other day I threw emotional cues into a scene on almost every line. Despite all the added words and phrases, it read much better. I could “feel” along with the scene. Then a couple days later I re-read it and was able to remove the places where I felt it became redundant or “over-the-top”
I’ve had critiquers who previously given me the sole comment of “I don’t relate to this character so I have nothing to say” now say “wow, I really get this person, I can really see what she’s going through.”
So what I’m saying is don’t be afraid to go too far with this. If you have to cut, leave the emotional journey in and cut everything else.
Great guidelines! I really appreciate your comments!