- We perceive reality with our five senses
- Think of which senses you use the most in your world?
- If we don’t explore our world with our senses, how can we expect our characters to explore their world?
- The use of the senses in writing helps make our characters come alive
- The use of the senses in writing helps convince our readers our story is real
- The five senses helps us, as authors, invoke the world inside our characters as well as the world around them
Use of the Senses to Answer, “What Happens Next?”
- Think of the five senses as plotting devices
- Use the awareness of the sensual aspects of your characters to solve the problem of what happens next
- Your character’s senses can guide you through the difficult transitions into action
- When the reader identifies with your characters, your reader will root for your characters
- Let the senses create and, sometimes rule, your characters moods and actions – just like they do us in real life
- Use the five senses as a technique to develop your plot into connected scenes – it is a great way to place your characters in the story
Show, Don’t Tell
- Use of the five senses is a great way to show your reader what you are saying
- Showing is illustrating our story through words
- Your goal in writing is to evoke and not order a response from your readers
Using the Five Senses to Create the Perfect Setting
- What we, as authors, imagine must be transmitted to paper
- We want our readers to feel they are a part of the scene – we want them to experience it, become a part of the scene
- How does the setting make your characters feel while they are in any particular scene?
Using the Five Senses to Create a Feeling of Sensuality
- In romances, it is essential that descriptions of characters appeal to all five senses
- Using the five senses in a love scene makes it about emotion and not biology
- Sensuality is not just reserved for love scenes – you can give your writing a sensuous quality with the five senses
- Sensory writing should create scenes that are alive with emotion
In my workshop, I use the five senses make characters three dimensional, to help with plotting, and setting. To add depth to a writer’s story.