Thursday, October 26, 2017

Excerpt from a workshop #4 (emotional through-lines)

Also remember—and this is one of the most important takeaways from this workshop. Say what you mean, unless you are showing emotions the character doesn’t know they have, or are controlling for some reason or another.

Looking at this paragraph, you used the word and phrase “furious” and “really angry”. From a glance at the rest of the chapter, Jane is “really angry”, she isn’t furious. Furious implies a totally different set of actions and reactions. "Really angry" implies the stuff you already have in place. It’s like a scale. Unless the progression of emotion is still continuing (you know, like she’s moving from angry to furious), then just name it and move on, so you can work on other stuff. The emotional through-line, where she is really angry, will keep going until you do something to derail it. 

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