Day 19 How much do you need to describe your character’s appearance? I asked my son how he approaches describing his characters;
“I intentionally never described Nevaeh’s appearance in detail. Partially because it wasn’t necessary, but also because I didn’t want to make people see my idea of “attractive” when they pictured her. I just described her as “attractive” and let people decide for themselves what that meant. Guys could picture loved ones. Women could picture themselves or someone they admire. If I’ve written the character’s personality right, then people will picture her as a beautiful person without me needing to describe her features.” – Benjamin T. Collier, referring to his female protagonist in The Kingdom.
I used this approach to describing my characters unless, as Ben explained, the external details will later be revealed to be of significance to the story. For example, I wrote the clothing transformation from dreary to expressive that my female protagonist went through, to ‘show-don’t-tell’ her inner transformation from depressed to confident. So, usually, it’s unnecessary to describe all the physical features of a character. Leave that to the reader’s imagination.
My blogs through the first half of NaNoWriMo were mostly subjective. During this second half of the process I’m hoping to bring you some useful writing insights too – as well as my personal struggles and triumphs. On that note, today was grocery shopping day and I added some Christmas shopping in there too and lunch at Boston Pizza. Word count? I’d rather not say.
Back to hitting those keys at breakneck speed tomorrow! Good Night from the NaNo Novice.
Lynne
Lynne Collier 