Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Facts versus Feelings #MFRWauthor #amwriting #writer'stips

There are facts and feelings. Both are part of our books. The facts are the places where the characters exist. The facts are data. Bur if you wrote your book and only wrote the facts, you would have something that sounded more like non-fiction that fiction. The difference in these is the feelings.

How does a character react to a sunset, a house or any other piece of data. This is what makes fiction work. Showing the reader what all the data means to these particular characters. Each character in the story may have a different reaction to the same piece of data. This is what makes the story sing.

Feelings lead to reactions. I hate that dress. The character may react by rolling the dress into a ball and tossing it away. This shows feelings in actions and the reader can't help but see the character and feel with them.

Feelings are subjective. They come from the characters experiences in the world. If a character has no feelings, no emotional reaction to anything, you have created a robot. So let your characters have feelings. Let them love or hate something and show their reactions to a particular bit of data.