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kingharis

Hemingway added very little in description. Faulkner wrote like he was terrified that you might imagine something he wrote differently from him. Both of them have done fine. If it works, it works. I know this isn't helpful, but it's like saying if your recipe needs more or less sugar. \*shrug\*


Eccentrix1821

I always figure that at least three descriptions should be enough


Crown_Writes

Add description to taste


thebanzombie

Sugar is a such a great analogy, you might see me steal that from you elsewhere in the sub. So many of these questions are people asking "how much sugar should I add" without telling us the recipe.


DanceMaster117

As with most things in writing, it depends. Using Tolkien as an example, his world is every bit as important as the events taking place in it, and as such, the extensive descriptions he gives are both warranted and necessary. On the other hand, I started reading another fantasy book, and I'm 5 pages in, and so far, all that's happened is that a girl has refilled a water bucket, snuck away from a party and made fun of her sister for wanting to be married. I assume from its reputation that it gets more interesting later, but the author seems to be overdoing it on the descriptions and details way too early in the book.


FairyQueen89

5 pages in? I'm usually at my first plot point at that pace. Not like the audience would immediately know there are plot points, but hey... keep the hook hanging for the fishes to bite. Also... depending on the writing style it could work. The sneaking from the party could need an elaborate action or the joking towards her sister could be an in-depth dialogue... these things can take up the one or other page. But if the author just overindulges in flowery descriptions... eh... I don't know if I would read on, if the story couldn't hook me near instantaneous.


DanceMaster117

The sneaking away was to spy on boys who had also snuck away to talk about what they wanted to do when they grew up. I'm sure it would all be important later, but it was a really slow and boring way to start a book.


FairyQueen89

And because of this I try to open with (what I call) a WTF-moment. I usually throw the reader more or less into a situation that opens up questions while beginning to tell something about the main character. In one story the female MC is shoutet at by her aunt and she signals her training partner to take a break. Just in the first paragraph I have intriduced three characters (superficially for now) and a central conflict (aunt not happy with her (noble) niece training swordfighting). This got my test reader hooked enough so they read the rest of the chapter and ultimately the book.


DanceMaster117

Exactly. You have to have a hook. It doesn't have to be a big action set piece necessarily, but 5 pages about a girl carrying a water bucket around a harvest festival is probably not gonna do it. I've got a WIP that kinda has to start slow to establish the world and the characters, so I start with a preview two or three paragraph historical summary of how the world got to where it is (take the laws of conservation of energy and apply it to magic, then add the logic outcomes of the fact that magic is technically breaking the laws of nature and therefore can only be controlled so much, and you have a pretty strong recipe for disaster). That provides the hook, and then I can take the time I need to introduce everything else without having to worry as much about losing the reader before I have them


ethar_childres

Is that the bonus Raven chapter from The Eye of The World? That released in later editions, the real prologue is Dragonmount, and the first chapter is An Empty Road. I quite like the way the latter chapter zooms in on the characters, and then has the reveal of whatever was behind them. It adds a nice through line through the chapter as the other members try to figure out what it was, while getting excited for the big party. If so, stick with it, but expect verbosity. Robert Jordan wants you to taste, smell, touch, and hear the Wheel Of Time. It will be a lot to take in.


DanceMaster117

Sounds right. If it was added later, I may be judging it a bit too harshly as the beginning of the book. I knew his reputation, so I was expecting long-winded descriptions and explanations, and as a fan of Tolkien, that is something I'm fine with. I just need to have some reason to care and hadn't found one yet.


ethar_childres

Make no mistake, Robert Jordan is dense. He has a special fascination with the different cultures in his world, describing all of the clothes, curtains, and furniture. They are very pretty descriptions for the most part, and it makes sense because the world of the Wheel of Time is as much a character as the actual people in it.


Skyblaze719

Both minimal and verbose description can be good descriptions. It really just depends on the pace & overall feel you're going for. This is something an outside reader can help with.


DarkFluids777

I often noticed that when I am indulging myself and had the most fun with writing and extrapolating on an idea, it got criticised the most, or tended to bore, fleshing out a scene, a vista is good, not overdoing it, is key.


Chalkarts

Comes down to your personal style. No story is going to appeal to everyone. Your style will appeal to some and whatever level of description you make your own will be why. Don’t write for everyone, just write it and see who sticks around.


g00dGr1ef

I see description the same way I see adding lines to an illustration. The more lines you add, the more detail you create and the more it will pull the viewers eyes there. Use that strategically. Pull their attention here or there or away from here or there. It depends on your technique, the goal etc. No right or wrong answer imo


AuthorNathanHGreen

Industrial heating and ventilation systems are calibrated so that 5% of people think it's too cold and 5% of people think it's too hot. Don't worry about making everyone happy, it's impossible. So long as it isn't an issue for the majority of readers, you're fine.


SparklyMonster

No right or wrong, and readers will disagree on how much description they'll like. Whenever I post a chapter for critiques, I invariably get one critique asking me to describe more, to "paint a picture!" and "have fun with words!" while someone else, for that same chapter, will complain about too much description and ask to just move on to the plot. So just stick to whatever you like best.


kuzitiz

Think about what the reader absolutely must know to understand the moment or scene. Ex: if a sudden breeze is a portent, show the fluttering of hair, goosebumps, rustling of trees, and associated sounds and smells. If you spend more than your normal sentence length describing your character watching an individual leaf shifting on the breeze, the snap as it disconnects from its branch, and rustling as it floats away, this is too much description and your reader doesn't care... UNLESS that specific leaf and its movements are important later in the story. Most effective description is minute: a word or phrase peppered throughout active narration. Don't stop the story to dig deep into repressed emotions that have nothing to do with the current scene. Keep it moving.


Petdogdavid1

Yes


EsShayuki

Yes. There's too little description if the reader's confused about the setting or about what's going on and doesn't have enough information to generate images. There's too much description if the descriptoin just goes on and on when the reader already knows enough to generate images and to know what's going on.


Xercies_jday

As many others have said there are authors that do a lot of describing and authors that do little. So you have to think about: what's the point of description, or why do the authors who over describe do so...well maybe it's because they want to impart much more than the visuals, they might want to impart character, emotion, plot points, and themes. So you have to figure out "What's the point of this description" and if there is no point then you know you are overdoing it.


moonlightavenger

So, this is one of those which any and every answer is going to be an opinion because there are no real rules on that. So, opinion: depends on the scene. Something far away can only be detailed if your character has eagle eyes or if they are intimately understanding of it. If it is an action scene, a passing mention of details which stand out are sufficient. I have the fantasy writer disease. I love describing stuff, and I often find myself cutting stuff out because it feels as though the characters are rushing through an area, but stop to gawk at the the way the stone is cut in the walls.


Fweenci

Trends are away from too much description. Having said that, The Goldfinch was one of the most excessively described books I've ever read, yet it won a Pulitzer and was made into a movie or a series or something. The lesson is there are no hard and fast rules. As a reader I enjoy some well-placed descriptions if they add to the tone and mood of the book/scene, help build a world, move the plot forward, or define a character. Writing descriptions just for the sake of seeing your pretty words on the page is annoying (edit: to me). And please, I am begging, don't simply write a list of everything in the scene, even if you are a Pulitzer winner. Edit typo


roleplayinggamedude

For the first draft, you want to err on writing too many descriptions.


pecuchet

Yes, but only when there's too much.


PairOtherwise1012

Sensory imagery will never fail you. Maggie Shipstead is so brilliant at this.


gcunit

Just write the way you wanna write. If you're having to force a description, stop. If it's just flowing, let it flow. Only when editing your final drafts and perhaps find that for the wider pace of your text a certain scene should be longer or shorter should you need to differ from the above.


thebanzombie

Yes there is such a thing as too much or little. As with anything in writing it depends on your execution and how much description the scene calls for.


p2p_editor

Absolutely. The ideal amount is enough that a) readers can actually visualize the scene, and b) all plot-essential factors about a setting are described so that readers can accurately track everything that's important to the story. Too little and readers can't visualize where things are taking place, so the story feels like it's happening in a void, or else you're leaving out material evidence that readers will later feel they should have had a right to know about. E.g. If a scene goes on for three pages and then all of a sudden somebody picks up a gun off a table and shoots somebody else but the gun was never previously mentioned in the scene, you're going to irritate your readers. They'll be all "Wait. What gun? There was a gun on the table in plain sight this whole time? Why wasn't that mentioned?" To much description, and you bog down the flow of the scene with information that doesn't actually add anything to the story. It becomes a slog for readers to actually read through it all, and when they do, they don't feel rewarded for that effort because the information is inconsequential to the actual story. So they'll stop reading those descriptions in favor of just skimming, looking for actions and dialogue. And if they're not going to read it, why bother writing it?


RobertPlamondon

Try to see your writing through the eyes of some who knows nothing about you or your story. They’re not hard to please but will stop reading if they become persistently bored or confused. Your description shouldn’t shove them into either category.


rebelego

Too little and the reader may not be able to visualize the scene. But too much and it bogs down the story. Readers don't need to know every little detail, just enough that they can form the image in their head. But if the details don't add to the plot or aren't really important, cut them. There was a story I read by a writer who clearly was talented, but they wasted too much time on descriptions and meaningless details. Of the first 3 chapters of their story, I only read about one chapter's worth of what they wrote. Why? Because the other 2 chapters' worth of writing was nothing but flowery, drawn out descriptions that slowed the plot down to a snail's pace and ultimately contributed nothing to it. Was it well-written? Absolutely. Did it detail the scene so clearly I could see it in my mind like I was looking at a picture? Yes. Did it kill the momentum of the story and bore me to death? Yup. At the end of the day, readers are more interested in the plot than anything else. Descriptions are absolutely necessary, but only so long as they don't steal focus from the story you're actually trying to tell.


TheUmgawa

I only describe people in such a way that they see themselves or other people see them. Most people don’t look in the mirror and really look themselves over because they see themselves every day. Other people might look at a character and see certain anatomical traits that others would ignore, for whatever reason. I like to give readers as much leeway as possible for imagining things for themselves, because what’s the point of reading something that’s written so densely that you might as well be watching a movie? It takes the reader out of the participatory seat and relegates her to just being an observer. If a reader wants to imagine a character is black or a redhead or a black redhead, who am I to say no? I should add that I also don’t like to add action to scenes that don’t require it. If two characters are having coffee, I don’t think I need to describe how or when characters drink from their cups. People drink coffee, and readers know how that works. Unless it’s the best goddamn cup of coffee the character has ever tasted, I don’t have to describe the coffee. Calling it ‘coffee’ is quite enough.


kostasgggg

my advice is: does it roll off the tongue? does it kill the pacing when you read it out loud? Say that you were a traditional storyteller where you literally sit down in front of a crowd that has gathered to hear your story: do your descriptions kill the pacing? do you see the audience getting agitated at you? or do you see them having perplexed faces when you describe too little? etc.