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Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Blocking the Movement of Characters

A word of advice as you move your characters around the page. It's not necessary to block each movement because the details can overwhelm the reader. An example to address this is changing: "Ellen comes around to the armchair and sits down. Her whole body is shaking." To: "Ellen's whole body is shaking as she lowers herself into the armchair."

In the first quote you have a sentence that is pure blocking followed by a sentence with the interesting detail. Merging the two lends authenticity to the interesting detail, eliminates a less dynamic sentence and allows the reader the freedom to imagine the layout of the room to suit them.

In first person it can be especially intrusive to block the characters' movements and you end up with something I call the "cooking show" effect whereby it sounds like this: "I'm adding two eggs and then I'm folding them in." Characters shouldn't be narrating their lives as they go, just living them.

Example,

I opened the door and found my wallet lying open on the seat. (cooking show)

Inside the car, my wallet lay open on the seat. (not the cooking show)

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