Pay Attention to the Details

One of the times that I attended the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching in Cullowhee, North Carolina, a staff member told about injuring her hand because of a large envelope she'd gotten in the mail. I saw the cast around her hand and asked, "What was in the envelope?" 

She looked at me with surprise. "You know, out of all the people I've told this story to, you're the only one who's asked about that."

Looking at this with hindsight, it was the detail oriented writer coming out in me. Details are crucial to a story, but how a writer presents the details is just as important. In some fiction, the author gives the details in separate paragraphs, and sometimes these get lengthy. I always feel like the author is trying too hard to impress, and I often get bored, if the story doesn't soon begin to move forward.

I prefer to make descriptive paragraphs short when necessary, and work the sense of place and setting into the story, as it evolves. However, it's important not to forget about any of the details. I'm also an avid reader, and I've read book after book, where the unchangeable details about a character will be different later on in the book, or where the author has forgotten her own details of the story. I work hard to keep this from happening in my books, and I encourage other writers to do the same.

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