How to Stop Your Novel Sounding Like It’s a Screenplay

Make Your Writing Tighter, part 1

You might have heard the phrase ‘make every word count’. And you might have heard that ‘tight writing is good writing‘. But what do these phrases actually mean? What constitutes ‘tight writing’? And what words might not be necessary? And what is over-directing?

There are four main areas where novelists fall into the trap of OVERWRITING, particularly when new to the craft:
– Over-direction
– Excessive timeline nudges
– Over-description
– Repetition and Redundancy (telling twice)

Many authors imagine scenes in their heads in a visual way. They see the characters as they move and interact. As a result, when they cast these imaginings into words they frequently over-describe the detail of what they are seeing. They underestimate the reader’s ability to work things out for themselves. In this first part of a four-part blog series, I offer a quick guide to understanding (and dealing with) the first of these issues – OVER-DIRECTION.

Over-directing (writing like it’s a screenplay)

When a writer creates a screenplay, they need to direct every single character in every single move.

They indicate where the characters are looking (and what they are looking at), how they move from A to B and what they are doing with their hands. In a novel, this is not always necessary. Why? Because the reader can be trusted to know how a door opens, and doesn’t need to be told the detail. The reader will (most of the time) know how to start a car. They know how to turn on a computer. Have a look at the following (made-up) paragraph:

Brian placed his feet on the floor, gripped the arms of the chair and moved himself into a standing position. Carefully putting one foot in front of the other, he moved the six feet across the room towards the door. Approaching the door, he placed his hand on the door knob, turned it and pushed the door open.

What does this paragraph say to you? I’m immediately wondering whether Brian has difficulty with mobility, or is inebriated, or is under the control of some higher force. If any of these assumptions is correct, then this type of writing is fair enough. But if Brian doesn’t have mobility issues, hasn’t been drinking and is fully in control of his own movements, then this is a drastic case of overwriting. It could be simplified to:

Brian stood up, walked the short distance to the door and opened it.

Of course, if there is a reason why the reader needs to know the details, then they should be included. If there is something exceptional about x character doing x mundane task then absolutely the details should remain.

If an extra-terrestrial being is inhabiting a human’s body and is attempting to ring a doorbell, then the following sentence is perfectly acceptable:

He lifted his hand, extended his finger and pressed the doorbell.

But if it is just your regular common or garden Fred next door who is pressing the doorbell, then this can be simplified to:

He rang the bell.

The point is that the reader knows what is involved with ringing the bell, and does not need the basic steps pointed out.

How to avoid over-directing

Once a writer is aware of this issue, it’s extremely easy to fix. Re-read your text. Assess whether you are trusting the reader to understand basic points (and simultaneously check that you are not OVER-trusting them!). And edit out the unnecessary descriptions.

Trusting the reader is something that comes as an author grows confidence in their writing, but this particular issue is incredibly easy to deal with. A good editor will pick this up and edit out the unnecessary words.

And this is the first step towards making every word count.