The talented Jen Wylie shares her wisdom.

I want to extend a warm welcome to Jen Wylie.  I’m excited to have her her today on her blog tour for the release of her first short story, Jump.

First of all I’d like to give some super big thanks to Julie for hosting me on her most wonderful blog! She has asked me to write on a topic of my choice, so today we shall discuss our feelings! 🙂 Yes, seriously. Don’t worry, I won’t sit you down on a couch and ask you strange questions and pretend to make notes.

I want to talk to you about portraying emotion in writing. Not an easy thing to do sometimes. I am a very emotional person, luckily for me this works well in my writing. I want the reader to FEEL the words, to cry at the sad parts, to at least smirk at the funny ones and have their hearts speed up during tense or action packed scenes.

Easy to say, but there is a fine line between making the reader feel and being over descriptive and causing their eyes to glaze over so they skip ahead to a less wordy paragraph.

It’s not always the quantity of the descriptive words used, but the quality. This can be as simple as using a descriptive tag instead of a simple one. Example: “You really piss me off,” she said. Try instead “You really piss me off,” she snarled. Even better, try removing the tag all together and add a brief description instead; “You really piss me off!” Trembling in anger, she struggled not to throttle the idiot.

Don’t forget to portray what your character is feeling. You may know, however does the reader? This can be done by simply writing what they feel– Happiness bubbled within her. Or you can portray their feelings through their actions or reactions; She clenched her jaw, Her eyes narrowed, She looked away, a faint smile coming to her lips.

It is also important to not only display your characters emotions, but also their feelings toward other characters, objects, actions etc. How does the character feel around another? How does this feeling cause them to react? Does it make them smile, frown, their eyes light up? How do they physically interact, do they touch or avoid contact? You do not need to write lengthy descriptions, a simple descriptive sentence or two can reveal a lot. A good exercise is to take note of how you or others interact physically during events or conversations.

Happy writing! I hope you are now NOT feeling confused. 🙂

~~~

Jump is my my very first published work coming out Dec 15 2010.

My next short story, The Forgotten Echo, will be coming out March 1 2011 and my novel, Sweet Light,  in May 2011.

Jump

If you were told to jump off of a bridge would you? Perhaps it would depend on who was doing the asking. Our heroine has spunk and a sense of humor, however suffers from an extreme case of inappropriate clothing. When things take a turn from dangerous to worse what will she do when fantasy becomes reality? Warning: May include hot leather clad men, singing and demons.

Author Bio

Jennifer Wylie was born and raised in Ontario, Canada. In a cosmic twist of fate she dislikes the snow and cold.

Before settling down to raise a family, she attained a BA from Queens University and worked in retail and sales.

Thanks to her mother she acquired a love of books at an early age and began writing in public school. She constantly has stories floating around in her head, and finds it amazing most people don’t. Jennifer writes various forms of fantasy, both novels and short stories. Sweet light is her debut novel to be published in 2011.

Jennifer resides in rural Ontario, Canada with her husband, two boys, Australian shepherd a flock of birds and a disagreeable amount of wildlife.

My website: www.jenniferwylie.ca

My blog: http://jlwylie.wordpress.com/

Jump is available for preorder here: https://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-jump-493574-234.html

 

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