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Q&A Does the following piece have too much dry narration (mundane tasks, moving about)?

I don't think the information is entirely unnecessary, but it's dry. Lauren gave a good answer about adding more feeling; in this answer I'll focus on another style issue. You have a lot of "she ...

posted 11y ago by Monica Cellio‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T02:56:44Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/8212
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by (deleted user) · 2019-12-08T02:56:44Z (over 4 years ago)
I don't think the information is entirely unnecessary, but it's dry. Lauren gave a [good answer about adding more feeling](https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/8208/1993); in this answer I'll focus on another style issue.

You have a lot of "she did this, then she did that, then she did something else...". That feels repetitive. Sometimes you want to convey the action itself; other times you want to convey a _state change_. For example, you wrote:

> Tsuki woke up to the morning sun that entered through the window. She yawned and sat on the side of the bed, rubbing her eyes. The clock on the wall said half past ten. She brushed her teeth, washed her face, and then went downstairs. When she reached the dinning room, she realized that there was no one there. Not even the owner of the inn. She checked the kitchen. No one either. They were probably still asleep. Her stomach started growling—but no one was preparing breakfast. It was probably not right, but guided by her hunger, Tsuki went to check the refrigerator. Luckily, there was a can of tuna and tomatoes. So together with some bread, she fixed herself a simple sandwich.

Consider instead:

> Sunlight streamed through the window, awakening Tsuki. Letting out a yawn as she sat up, she glanced at the clock on the wall -- half past ten already. After washing and dressing she went downstairs to an empty dining room. Where was the owner? The kitchen, too, was empty; was everybody still asleep? It probably wasn't right, but her growling stomach sent her to the refrigerator, where she found a can of tuna and some tomatoes. Taking some bread she found on the counter, she assembled these into a simple sandwich to slake her hunger.

I did several things in that rewrite:

- changed some "she did" phrases into _descriptions_: "awakening Tsuki", "letting out a yawn"

- conveyed some information without adding more action verbs at all: "half past ten already" (that the clock said it is implied), "an empty dining room" (she doesn't need to realize anything)

- moved some of the less-important actions into subordinate clauses: "after washing and dressing" (which I also collapsed, judging that brushing her teeth isn't important except as part of this routine)

- used "action" verbs for actors other than Tsuki: "her growling stomach sent her to the refrigerator"

- turned a straight description into "dialogue" to show rather than tell: "Where was the owner?" instead of "she realized that there was no one there"

- used a mix of approaches; doing any one of the above to the exclusion of the others would be just as problematic as your original

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2013-06-21T17:25:43Z (almost 11 years ago)
Original score: 6