Activity

Thanks for tagging me, Noah!

 

Replacements for look

I usually use “Fernya shot her son a quick glare,” instead of something like “Fernya gave her son an icy look.” Maybe if you rearrange the wording a little bit, you won’t have to keep using “look” in that context?

 

Thoughts on ‘said’ replacements:

Ahh, my favourite thing to discuss. 😁 I have a villain in my main WIP, and I had a thought while creating him: why don’t I try to make an effort not to use “said” in regard to him? So every time he speaks, it goes something like this:

“Rúan Pyrestone,” he purred, “to what do I owe this pleasure?”

“Good,” Osløn rumbled, his eyes narrowed. “One lesson learned. Now for the next: submission.”

It’s actually quite fun, though challenging to find more sensual words in replacement for “said.”

 

Facial Features:

Mmm, another of my favourites. I love describing faces. To me, facial descriptions are very important. It’s the main feature of the person, especially if you’re first meeting them. And since the description of the person’s face will vary, like how a mother sees her son versus how a bully sees him.

An example from my WIP, from my MC’s mother’s point of view:

Rúan’s eyebrows met in a long, reddish furrow, his lips pulled tight into a taut line. His sea green eyes — normally twinkling with an impish mischief — were shadowed but burning, the smouldering embers in the pit of a silent fire.

I think facial features are super important, but it’s also important to bear in mind who is describing them. 🙂

 

Parents:

Like someone said already, it’s important to note the relationship between the character and his parents. My main character has a close bondage with his mother, but he doesn’t have too much respect for his elders in general, so in his mind, his mother is both “Mother” and “Fernya.” 😅

 

She said vs said she:

I use “she said” over “said she,” though if I’m trying to go for more of a classical feel to the story, I’ll use “said she.”

 

He gave a tight smile vs he smiled tightly:

I’d have to agree with you on the adverb aversion. It just sounds a little clumsy when said: “he smiled tightly.” But more often than not, I’ll use: “Tightly smiling, he said [insert whatever]” I think it just depends on what sounds better.

 

Chapter Names:

Okay, so my reason for not using chapter names may sound silly, but … I’m too lazy to come up with a good name for each chapter of my story. 😂 Another thing is that whatever is the main part of the chapter normally determines the chapter name, and sometimes I want to keep that a surprise.

 

Inches, feet, meters, etc.. in medieval fiction:

Ooh, uhm … hehe, I don’t really have a set list of measurements that I use for my WIP, which is a mishmash of fantasy/dystopian/medieval. When I want to measure the height of a sword, I’ll normally say something a long the lines of this:

The sword was probably twice as long as my forearm, meaning it was easily the largest sword I’d held, seeing that I was about a head taller than the average man.

But if I want to measure distance, I use leagues and miles.

 

Voice Description

Again, I normally use sensory description to describe a character’s voice, like I did with Osløn. ☺️

 

Direct (italicized with I’s and me’s) vs indirect thought

So my WIP is set in first person, in the eyes of my main character Rúan. Though occasionally the POV will switch to his mother, his betrothed, or his best friend. I don’t use direct thought for Rúan’s POV, since we’re already in his head, looking at the world through his eyes, but I also occasionally use it for the other POVs.

 

I hope this helped! 😊