I'm revisiting a book written by Jane Toombs and myself and seeing what inspiration I can find. Becoming Your Own Critique Partner was planned one evening at a conference when we had nothing else to do and had enjoyed a drink or two. We only sat and devised the titles for the chapters and then forgot about the project. One day, I was at my critique group and one of the members read her pages, I was bored. The entire bit she was read was in tell mode and I thought I was a child again being educated rather than entertained. I pulled up the list of chapters Jane and I had jotted down and saw the title Does Your Tell Need Showing. Just the thing for my critique partner. I rough drafted the chapter and sent it to Jane. Back it came with a lot of notes scribbled on the side but also came another chapter for the book. This is hoe it began and during the next few weeks I'll be using this as my inspiration for the writer's tips.
First- Tell is facts. Think of the nursers stories you were read when you were a child. Just a picture of what happened next. As a child, these stories pleased you but as you grew older , you needed more.
Take the Three Little Pigs Each of them builds a house. Along comes the wolf. He huffs and puffs and blows two of the houses down. He fails the third one. Story is fine but what could be missing.
Second - Show is emotions, actions and reactions, If you want to show the story of the Three Little Pigs, you need to add some of these. How did each one of them build their houses. Did the one who made his of wood bang his finger. Did they sweat? Where they afraid as they worked hoping to finish and be safe before the wolf came? How did they react when he arrived? All these things add to a story.
So when writing yours look at those tell passages adn try to intersperse a bit of show there or vise versa. Both tell and show have a role to play when you're writing a story.
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