Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

66%
+2 −0
Q&A How to be mindful of the reader when handling disturbing/distressing subjects?

I’m attempting to write some ‘difficult to read’ scenes such as violence, rape, trauma, etc. And I’m not talking about ‘good’ violence such as in Game of Thrones or a Quentin Tarantino film. The no...

6 answers  ·  posted 7y ago by sudowoodo‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Question fiction readers
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T07:11:34Z (about 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/30943
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar sudowoodo‭ · 2019-12-08T07:11:34Z (about 5 years ago)
I’m attempting to write some ‘difficult to read’ scenes such as violence, rape, trauma, etc. And I’m not talking about ‘good’ violence such as in Game of Thrones or a Quentin Tarantino film. The novel is about an abusive relationship, so I want the reader to be able to empathise with the victim and feel emotionally distressed on their behalf. But when it comes to the truly disturbing scenes, I don’t want to cause so much distress that they feel like putting the book down and never picking it up again. Is there a balance to be had? Is there anything I should keep in mind when attempting scenes like this?

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2017-10-20T16:48:29Z (about 7 years ago)
Original score: 22