Show Don't Tell Part 3

by Juanita Houston

​Welcome back to Part 3 in our discussion of Show VS Tell. You can find Part 1 here and Part 2 here.
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1.   Check the first two or three pages of your manuscript. Is there a log of white space? Plenty of dialogue? Or do you have block after block of narrative summary? Chances are, if you don’t see a lot of white space, you are telling.
2.   Re-read what you’ve written. Highlight passages where you have narrative summary or information dumps.
3.   Are you summarizing events or dialogue in which your characters participated, either as the story unfolds or before the story begins? If so, get a blank sheet of paper or open a new computer file and convert those summaries into scenes of action and dialogue. You might not use them in the final draft, but you will have them ready if you decide you need them.
4.   Highlight “Telling Words.” Telling words act as red flags. When you find one in a sentence, you are probably telling readers what you want them to know, rather than showing. Telling words are felt, had, heard knew, know, looked, saw, show, thought, was, watched, were, etc. Run your word processing program’s “Find” function and search for telling words. Or scan your manuscript pages for these telling words and highlight them or circle them.
5.   As you get through some of the lessons that have been in the newsletter or on this blog, you should have a good idea of how to change telling sentences into showing sentences. The highlighted or circled words on your manuscript will help you find these week sentences when you do your final revision. See the examples below for a brief explanation of how a search for telling words can help you identify weak writing.​

A telling sentence.

     Cassie saw the bird catch its dinner.

The word saw is a telling word. It’s your clue that the sentence isn’t showing. Now, not only is this a telling sentence, it is full of vague nouns, which something we’ll cover at another time. To make it a showing sentence you might say:

     Cassie followed the bird’s descent as it plunged downward, then soared skyward with its dinner dangling from its beak.

Here is another example of telling:

Bill was tired after his run to the corner and back.

The word tired expresses a state of being and is the clue that you are telling. Other “state of being words” are happy, sad, and hungry. Here is the same sentence edited to show the action:

After he sprinted to the corner and back, Bill leaned over, put his hands on his knees, and gasped for breath.

In this revised example, we do not tell you that Bill was tired. We show you that by his actions.
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Remember that showing is part of the infrastructure of good writing. We hope most of the techniques offered through these lessons will help you learn how to draw your reader into the story by showing - not telling- how your characters act, think and speak.

​Remember, the clock is ticking. Malice is accepting submissions to the Hit Me With Your Best Shot writing competition until 11:59p May 1. 

​Submit today!

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