I’ve discussed this before but I am bringing it up again. So there, nyah.
Anyway, I bring it up because it is something I am trying to do as I write BG4. I tend to write a lot of dialogue. While that isn’t all bad, I’d like to get the reader into the setting, and not just into the characters’ heads.
Where is that line between “setting as a character” and “adverb and adjective hell”?
The green trees and brown grass along with the purple flowers and gently flowing stream.
Eh, not so bad. Not a complete sentence, either, but that’s beside the point. Do I go through and add some sort of adj. in front of every noun?
There is a book I read not too long ago that I about chucked across the room in just the opening paragraph. The character wakes up, goes to the bathroom to do whatever, goes to the kitchen, etc etc. But it is the bathroom with the Italian terra cotta tile and the glossy black counter and the lace curtains and the…blech. But then I realized that from that scene, I learned a lot about the character. She had money, lots of it. She liked the modern, sparse look. She’d probably never used her kitchen.
I have a character who is also overly rich but in the scene where SHE wakes up, the reader has no idea about it or anything else. She wakes up, realizes the one-night-stand has already left, goes to the kitchen to get coffee, and the phone rings. I use a few more words but basically, it is that boring.
I suppose that since, in both cases, the description of the apartment is important, to use adjectives would be a good thing. I want the reader to get built up for the crash that comes with the phone call. I want them to see and understand this character. Hmm. Food for thought, and low calorie too!
Meanwhile, my word count for BG4 is going slow. It currently sits at 9351 but should be 15,000 by now. Sigh. Somethings I think too much. Just write, dammit!