What does empathy in writing look like? The readers see and hear what the character does, as a result readers also feel what the character feels. How do you as a writer achieve this? You have to know your character’s wants, needs, fears, and motivations inside and out. Empathy is the act of feeling what others feel. Empathy and Desire Every well-written character wants something. Your job is to convey that to your readers in a visceral way. Make your readers ache along with your character. As obstacles thwart your character’s desires, readers will slip into the character’s skin and experience pain and loss, love and longing as if they…
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Head Hopping
Head hopping is the act of being in more than one person’s mind at a time. Why does this matter? Several reasons. First, it is confusing to the reader; second, it robs the reader of getting to know a character through his or her thoughts, history, and actions; and third, it interferes with the storytelling. Paragraphing Paragraphs are the writer’s friend. They organize chunks of text so the reader can better digest them. We learned in school that paragraphs start with a topic sentence and every sentence that follows must pertain to that topic sentence. We also learned, when writing dialogue each time the speaker changes, a new paragraph is…
