When you want to conceal the setting

Last time we compared minimalist fiction with the failure to provide adequate setting details. But sometimes, a writer may want to hold back setting details to provide a plot twist later. Like minimalism, this is a difficult technique to do well. It’s also been done before—a lot—so you have to …

Avoid blank stage syndrome

If readers don’t have enough sensory detail to go on, they can fail to engage with the story. Not knowing the story setting is very frustrating for the reader. In The Art & Craft of Writing Christian Fiction, Jeff Gerke says a scene with inadequate setting details “is like one …

Ground Your Readers in the Setting

Setting may not be the most important aspect of a novel, but it is critical to a great reader experience. Some genres are almost entirely defined by their settings. Regency romances are set in England during the early 1800s. Westerns are usually set west of the Mississippi in the late …

Finer Points of Pacing

Let’s quickly wrap up Pacing so we can move on to Setting. Here are the last few items in the Pacing segment of the Elements of Fiction Editing Checklist: ☐ Excessive step-by-step description of actions is avoided. When you describe each individual movement the character makes, you slow pacing to …

Logical Flow Propels Pacing

As we look at this item about pacing, it may sound familiar, because it is related to plot: ☐ Events flow logically in cause-and-effect relationships. That is, each scene doesn’t just happen after the prior scene, it happens because of the prior scene. When events flow from one to the …

Tension Keeps Readers Turning Pages

Writing teachers often say there should be “conflict” in every scene. There’s a problem with this, because too many writers think this means everyone always has to be arguing with everyone else. As if no two characters can ever agree on anything. There’s a difference between conflict and tension. We …

Pacing is a matter of proportion

Pacing is one of the more difficult elements of fiction because it is so subjective. A reader who loves rich description will enjoy a scene that lingers over the setting details, while another reader will complain that it’s slow and boring. Nevertheless, there are some aspects of pacing we can …