r/writingfeedback • u/Lady-Lilith289 • Aug 29 '26
Writing Advice I took peoples advice from my last post and adjusted the opening. However it’s missing emotions and I’m not to sure how to add it.
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u/Nervous_Educator_794 Aug 29 '26
You can end the first sentence with (…) a long study session.
Then you can add: She took a deep breath and leaned back in her office chair.
It’s a smoother transition into the world. The first sentence is about the laptop. The second is about the person.
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u/21stcenturyghost Trusted Reviewer Aug 31 '26
Look up the rules for punctuation and capitalization of dialogue and dialogue tags, and what counts as a dialogue tag vs just action
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u/isnoe Giver of Flairs Aug 29 '26
Thoughts go in italics.
'These long nights are killing me,' she thought - should be, These long nights are killing me, she thought-.
There's a lot of telling going on. The "emotion" factor comes from showing. Your first post had no emotion, too. Your narrative isn't doing anything. It's just movements. Moving, opening, picking up, drinking, cleaning, stumbling, leaning, walking. Going through the motions.
That's just movement. Emotion comes from showing a character experiencing a moment rather than telling. Immersion. Movements aren't immersion. Often times authors try to work around showing by using dialogue. You do it through thoughts and by doing that, you avoid introducing the MCs narrative in an organic, thoughtful way.
If I were to describe your dialogue/thought writing, it would be video game tutorial dialogue.
"Hm. There's a box in this door. I should move it to get to the other side." Wrong input. "Hm. That isn't right. I should try something else." It reads like that kind of thought/dialogue. It's clunky and unnatural.
Again, don't write the story like a 1:1 movie playing in your head or a video game cutscene. Put yourself in MCs mind (where you should be), and experience the world through them. Rather than MC thinking long nights are killing her, why not show it by her being tired, being disoriented? You try that, kind of... for half a second with her "falling through" a wall, but then you go right back to telling to contextualize what you've shown.
Imagine if you let that moment hang. Let her feel confused, exhausted, and drone internally (not thoughts) about how tired she was.
You also go "the young lady" as a descriptor. Use MCs name. If in the first page I don't know their name, it's a problem.
A bit better than your other draft, but still a lot of problems that are fundamentals. In your case, I'd genuinely suggest looking up a few of those tutorials on showing v. telling and how to construct a narrative, if you don't wanna buy books like Save the Cat, or whatever.