Thread by @KateBrauning

Time for more #subtips! More on emotional engagement and emotional dimension! To review here's my thread from last time:

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Your character can go through hell but if the reader isn't impacted emotionally, none of it matters. Breakout books move the reader. #subtips

I am specifically talking about mainstream fiction straddling the literary-commercial divide, and how to boost that breakout potential. Though these tools apply to a lot of books! #subtips

Almost every MS I have to pass on gets a rejection letter because of lack of emotional engagement. People may call it weak plot, slow pace, weak voice-- but those wouldn't matter nearly so much if we were emotionally gripped. #subtips

PS, the eternal question of why some "weak" stories sell like hotcakes comes down to this-- emotional engagement. They may do other things poorly but they GRAB our emotions. #subtips

Many books have emotions that feel simplified, sterilized, reduced to the lowest common denominator. The richness and surprise are missing, and that's what connects us so strongly. #subtips

Last time I talked about several ways to get that connection. (See first tweet in thread.) Here are more ways to develop the emotional connection and dimension in your MS: #subtips

"Fear" is never just fear. When your character is afraid, show an old fear, a new fear, a way in which they're ashamed, something they regret. And lift it all with an impossible hope. #subtips

This gives MILES of dimension to being afraid, it boosts the stakes, and it offers so much richness and nuance that our minds start sorting through, processing it-- and that's engagement. We suddenly care. #subtips

Tool 2: Break the box. We love characters who are larger than life, who say what we wish we could say, who do what we wish we could. Give readers those things. In each scene you want to have more impact, try this: #subtips

Make a list of 10 of the biggest things your character can do. The most surprising or cutting thing they can say or do. The most shocking line they can cross. The thing with emotional value they can break. #subtips

Pick the action that works best for the scene-- or a few! A surprising, shocking, or out-of-bounds statement, action, thought. Give us the things we wish we could say and do. #subtips

Tool 3: With betrayal and forgiveness, writers tend to focus on the MC. Double down on developing the one who betrayed, and the one who needs forgiven. Judas and Mr. Lovegood are compelling characters for a reason. #subtips

Tool 4: Identify the emotional goal for every scene. What's the MC's internal need, not for the book but for this moment? Use the action to push the character further away or pull closer to that goal. Do this in every scene for noticeable change. #subtips

Tool 5: This is a prose tool. Use emotional reversals. Write a punchy paragraph at a key moment telling us what the character does NOT feel. (Surprise us with what those things are.) Then drive it home with what they DO feel. #subtips

Tool 6: Dig to the bottom of what the MC's feeling, then build it back up, and show it through a shifted lens- metaphor, reversal, action, or imagery. Here's how: #subtips

Get a markerboard or paper, space to work with mess. Pick a key emotional moment. List the primary emotions your MC is feeling, then dig down to third-level (see previous thread.) List it all. #subtips

Circle the ones that surprised YOU. Circle the ones that tug your heart. Ignore the obvious ones. Everyone else picks those. They're stale.
Carry over your circled ones to a new, clean space. #subtips

Think deeply about your new list of regret, aches, hope, loss. What else is this experience like? Craft a metaphor. What's some imagery with a piece of wisdom or implied contradiction? What stabbing truth reveals itself? #subtips

Carry the metaphor, analogy, imagery, or truth over to your MS in a beautiful, simple, punchy line or brief paragraph. Erase all the emotions you listed and let the subtext work for you. It's all there. #subtips

Final tool! 7: Project your character's emotions on the physical world using transferred epithet. This is using an adjective to describe the wrong noun. A common example "the lonesome highway." The road isn't lonely, you are #subtips

Transfer the emotion from the human to their surroundings. PG Wodehouse is a master of these. “I balanced a thoughtful lump of sugar on the teaspoon.”
“His eyes widened and an astonished piece of toast fell from his grasp.” #subtips

This can obviously be a device for humor. But they can be utterly serious and wrenching, too. Wilfred Owen does this in Dulce Et Decorum Est:
"Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time" #subtips

Transferred epithet makes surroundings come alive with the character's emotions. It does great world-building by adding so much texture and subtext. It’s a great device for unreliable narrators & narrators who can’t bring themselves to tell us what they think or feel #subtips

It’s a step removed, and so impacting because of it. Alright, that's it for now! More #subtips to come.

I like to keep my #subtips free so everyone can benefit, but I can only do that if I can pay my bills, and this took me well over an hour of my workday. So if you like my subtips & would like to leave me a tip here you're my hero. Super hugely appreciated ko-fi.com/A778QA3