Balancing Dialog and Detail

Hi All! I hope your Thanksgiving was fantastic. Mine was great, in fact we had two dinners. One at my daughters, which by the way was wonderful, and one at my house with my mom and granddaughter, Madison. Both we equally delicious and I enjoyed that extra time with family.

Now back to work - at least until Christmas. 

I've recently, as you know, been rewriting in Lore. One of the creative writing skills I've been trying to implement is more detail. I felt I had a little too much dialog in some scenes. Not to mention, a little too much "Blocking". 




What is blocking you ask? That's when you describe what the character is doing at the time, such as sitting down, standing, pacing, ect. As writers we always want to set the scene, it's just sometime you need to add a little more to the description and other times you want to just delete the minute details, such as blocking.

Your reader wants to know where the characters are and what they're doing. Things like where they are, what the room or area is like are important to visualize the scene. What the characters are wearing, or look like. What type of traits do they have? What's the environment, like the type of forest, or jungle are they in. 

True you don't have to do this with each scene, but when you are setting up a scene, like in the beginning of a chapter, you might want to let the reader know what's up. Also, don't forget the senses - taste, smell, see, touch and feel.  

There is a balance between dialog and detail. Some writers tend to go on and on with description, while other's do very little. When you're writing dialog, add a paragraph now and then to explain what the character is thinking or feeling. This builds the character up so that the reader gets a good sense of who he/she is. But there's no need to do this between every exchange. Just do it here and there so that the reader understands.

Plus by adding detail between dialog you can voice what the character thinks of the situation and the other characters involved. It's a good way to describe the characters that aren't the main character, while continuing to make your main character more life like. You can delve deeper into each character's traits. Just don't do it all at the same time. A little here and there should suffice in helping the reader get the feel of all of the characters in your story. 

So when trying to strike a balance, look at each dialog scene and see what you need to add or takeaway to make the scene easier to see and experience.

If you have a moment leave me a comment and let me know your struggles with this, or accomplishments. In the meantime, have a great weekend all. I know I didn't post last Friday, but I decided to focus on family time.

Love, Lisa