Webnovel.Forum

@Gourmet_DAO
For the third question.

For me, it is important to include the eye color, hair color, skin color shape of the face, habits and routines of the characters especially the important characters such as MCs or other character that can be seen in many chapters of your book.

Why? Because we are making a move! A literary art! Unlike mangas, comics and manhuas, our novel doesn't have illustrations. If we don't have illustrations our readers will only have a vague idea of our characters. It is important to let them imagine using the words and description you have given them. You might think that these were all pointless but in the readers' imagination, it is their fuel. It is the reason why they read.

Always remember that if you are writing, use your five sense. Hear, touch, smell, taste, and sight.

Always keep in mind that we need the readers to imagine what we are imagining the time we write. We are introducing them fictional characters, so we ought not to make them just 'fictional' but also relatable, that's why habits, beliefs and some other things were important too.

As for the room with guns hanging on the wall, it is part of what we call 'World-building' writing those simple descriptions will make your novel wven more immersive as if they were inside the novel itself.

Example: A room with a gun hanging on the wall. If you describe it like that, you can already tell the behavior of the owner of that room, maybe he's a hunter, a gun enthusiast or other related things.

Note: Even if something is not as important as you might think, it will surely pay-off in the long run. Even if some descriptions will not be seen in the future, still it is important in the present.

The third question -

The truth is all that stuff is terrible writing. The only web novel supports that stuff, and even then, it's only to talk about how sexy a woman is- the standard jade skin, huge tits. Etc we find in many novels. If you want to bring things up, make sure it affects the protagonist. For example, if he is a teenage boy, the whole jade skin thing might work. If you describe a setting, it should be to add a feeling, or emotion, or to cement a fact.

For example, if the gun on the wall, alludes to the fact that the owner of the place sells firearms, or is part of a black market or whatever. It works. But, if you're adding raw data into your novel, your readers will be burdened with too much information.

If your brought into the past, and you found yourself in your old home. The details of the home are the things that you would look at because it would act as evidence to an abnormal situation, but if you're going home on a normal day, you would rarely think of it.

If it's snowing, and the protagonist is cold, that's important. If it's snowing 100 miles away, and the protagonist is not even aware, you should not be writing about it.

In short, writers should only add details that affect the protagonist. If you wana write about blue eyes, write about what it does to the protag. If it does nothing, don't force it. You can bring that detail up in conversation etc.

Like
A girl venting, "OMG if only I had blonde hair and blue eyes."
Protag. "There is nothing wrong with your eyes, I think there cute."
"Shut up! Every girl has brown eyes. It's so normal."

It's impossible to write about every detail and most details are not important. Image writing like billy walks into a store-Then describing all the objects in the store. The type of tile, all the other people within, etc. Then he goes in buys a soda and leaves.

Your readers would be pissed. They had to keep track of all that data. Simply so that the protag buys a soda?

Don't like this post. Thanks <3

Acutelittletrap

I'm not understanding. If Billy walks into a store, and we describe all the people that are there, the quality of the tiles, his purchase, etc... why would readers be pissed?

We have a setting for the scene, the store. It's a bit old on the outside, paint flecks from the facade. Billy steps inside, the tiles are fatigued and yellow, and what few customers mill between the isles are the same. Old, haggard, like flecked paint; tired as they go about their evening. Their black hair and olive skin is familiar, because they look just like him, one of the misfortunates left behind by a booming economy.

Billy retrieves a soda from an old cooler, but the light is out, and the fridge is broken. He takes the lukewarm drink to the register, and grabs a bag of chips on the way. There's a smiling mascot on the bag, and the chips are his favorite flavor. He sets the drink down on the counter and drops the bag beside it. A joyless employee rings him up; he checks his wallet, he only has a dollar. He sets the bag aside, makes his purchase, and leaves with the soda, feeling no better than before.

If we're judging this paragraph by its end, we can say "oh, he only gets a soda, what was the point of that?" But we can use that scene to demonstrate the wealth of the area, the class that Billy lives in, and the demeanor of his peers. We can show that Billy is tired, perhaps old, and poor. We can show that he buys a warm soda, as opposed to a cold one, because as it was implied with the bag, it's his favorite treat. That he didn't complain that the machine was broken implies that he sympathizes, or understands, or perhaps isn't outspoken. Maybe he's the sort of person who doesn't make waves.

"Show, don't tell," is one of the most iconic idioms in writing. Whenever possible, demonstrate by the features in your scene what your character is feeling, what their world is like, and where they are placed within it. All of that data is crucial part of setting the scene, when Billy gets mugged the next street over, as his ghetto crumbles to riots that catapult Billy into the story's next arc.

ZenoWriter

The problem with all of that is that while the writing may not look bad, you did not progress the plot if you kept that going. Also, you added other elements in that example, the status of the world. The protags viewpoint and feelings. A feeling of depression. So, there was nothing wrong with the example you wrote as is.

What I was talking about is more like-

I walked into the store. It contained apples, oranges, and new shelving and brand new televisions. They were a couple of teenagers on the side kissing. One of the teenagers is a boy and he goes to school. The girl is attracted to the boy. The light was on. I walked inside and grabbed an apple from the fridge. I took it to the register and paid.

Both examples have a good amount of detail, but mine does not do anything with it. What you wrote is far better. But, it's not because of the details it's because you made those details do something. That something is the difference, and that supports the plot. Because the setting gives mood which in turn affects the protagonist.

-Don't like this post.