I find I’m nervous to post writing tips. It’s not because I think these are bad tips, but because I’m afraid they’ll come back to haunt me. Eventually I’ll post some of my original creative writing on here, and when I do, I will make some of these same mistakes I’m advising you not to make. It happens. Every writer makes these mistakes, even your favorite authors. Try your best to keep that in mind.
My first tip is brought to you by Brand New. When Jesse screams, “We don’t believe in filler, baby,” I feel it in my soul because he’s absolutely right. Filler is a vice almost every writer has, and one that every writer should try to avoid.
So, what is filler?
Filler can come in various forms. In some cases, it’s intentional. Remember the “fluff” you used to add to your high school and college essays to meet that ridiculous wordcount? Yeah, that’s filler. Most of the time, though, filler is unintentional. It can be writing about an event that’s not relevant to the story, or adding gratuitous descriptions, and it is definitely little words like “that” or “very” or “just” which exist to take up space. Basically, filler is anything in a story which doesn’t need to be there.
Let’s go over the first type of filler I mentioned. We’ve all heard of Chekov’s gun, right? The phrase allegedly comes from esteemed writer Anton Chekov. He’s quoted as saying, “If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one it should be fired. Otherwise don’t put it there.” In other words, don’t include erroneous details.
This can be a fine line to walk down. When is a detail important? When is it erroneous? This is something you have to figure out through practice. What I can tell you is an erroneous detail won’t further the plot or the character development. If you have a character who loves running, but at no point in your story do they go on a run, that’s an erroneous detail. It is also an erroneous detail if they go on a run, but nothing happens aside from… running. If this is a detail you want to include, it needs to be made integral to the plot or character development. We can do this directly or subtly.
For an example, we’ll use the gun metaphor. If you’re writing about a character who’s a big hunter, it would make sense to describe a gun on the wall of his house. This adds to the credibility of the character being a hunter. In fact, if you wanted to be specific and say the gun on the wall was a 6.5 Creedmor, you’d be letting the audience know through this detail that the character is a big game hunter. The gun might never be fired, but by putting it on the wall you’ve subtly given information about the character, which is just as good in my opinion. This is an example of a detail that’s integral to character development.
The version of this example where the detail is integral to plot development would be the initial, more direct version of Chekov’s gun. Someone might break into the hunters house, but he escapes unscathed because he uses the gun hanging on the wall for self defense. Thus, the gun on the wall has become integral to the plot.
Now, let’s take a look at the second type of filler which is unnecessary descriptions. The first thing I think of here is the fantasy genre. Part of fantasy is world building, where you take a large amount of time to describe the setting. This is because a fantasy writer can’t rely on the reader to fill in the blanks. If I tell you the setting is in Chicago, you’ll immediately picture the skyscrapers and city lights, but for fantasy this isn’t true. There’s no way for us to know what The Shire looks like until Tolkien describes it.
In fantasy this level of description can be necessary, I say “can be” because even fantasy authors overdo description from time to time. Outside of fantasy, the tolerance for this kind of description is slim. For everything that follows, add the phrase “unless it’s integral to plot or character development” after it. Ready? We don’t need to know everything a character eats at every meal. We don’t need vivid descriptions of every single outfit a character wears. We don’t need superfluous descriptions of appearances, and we definitely don’t need an overactive inner-monologue if your book is written in first person point of view. None of this is necessary UNLESS it’s integral to plot or character development.
Now, The Lord of the Rings books include an extreme amount of description. They’re great books, but they’re tedious at times. I know that’s not true for everyone, some people love the pages upon pages of setting description, but I am not one of those people. The reason it works so well for these novels in particular is that Tolkien put an amazing amount of effort into developing them. He created entirely new races, vast settings, political systems, and he even made a useable language. He got away with describing so much because everything he described was novel to the reader, he’d invented it himself. Not to mention it was so well thought out that many of us are drawn the sheer magnitude of his skill.
However, we’re not all Tolkiens. Unless your willing to put in the effort, keep the detail slim and trim.
The third type of filler is the easiest to explain and the easiest to correct. When I point this out to you, you’ll probably never stop seeing it, so you’re welcome and I’m sorry. Anytime you use the words “that”, “just”, or “very”, see if it’s absolutely necessary. If not, trim it. Some examples:
I went to the store that’s around the corner. I went to the store around the corner.
He was very angry with me. He was angry with me. He was infuriated with me.
I just wanted to let you know I’m leaving early today. I wanted to let you know I’m leaving early today.
This doesn’t really make sense. This doesn’t make sense. This doesn’t make a lick of sense.
These are simple examples, but I’m sure you get the picture. The first sentences use one of the easily trimmable words, and the following sentences show how you could trim them, or even replace them for a stronger sentence. We fall into the habit of adding filler words when we talk to ease the meaning of what we’re saying, but in writing we don’t need to do that. The one place you can get away with filler words is dialogue. To accurately portray how someone speaks, you can include these words because it is an accurate representation of how we talk. But we don’t want to write in a circuitous way, we want our words and meaning to be clear and succinct.
So, what things should you describe and how much detail should you add? Well, I don’t have an easy answer for you. Some detail is good, not enough is lackluster, and too much is egregious. It’s a hard line to walk, but it’s one that’s expected of us, so we “just” have to figure it out. These are some tips I follow:
When it comes to setting, description is good. This is one area where it’s difficult to over-describe because we generally like to know where we are and what’s going on around us. It is especially true if the setting is somewhere you’ve made up, or if it’s a part of the story (think of how the setting of Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher IS the story). If the setting isn’t all that important, don’t waste too much time on it. It’s all about what kind of writer you are and what kind of story you want to write.
Things that can always use less description: clothing and appearance. My least favorite kind of description is the “mirror” segment. This is when the main character walks up to a mirror, looks into it, and proceeds to describe themselves in great detail. It’s unnecessary, and in my opinion it’s a rather lazy way to describe your character. Don’t do this, and if you do it, you better do it well. Most of the time we want to know what the character looks like a little bit, but we don’t need their exact measurements. Let the reader use their imagination. This goes for clothing too. Sometimes it helps to have a general style for the character, but unless fashion is a part of the story (if it says something about your character, describe away), we don’t need to know what they’re wearing every time they get dressed. It’s also suffice to say “high-wasted jeans and a Coca-Cola t-shirt” rather than describe every facet of their outfit.
When it comes to filler words, trim excessively. Rewrite your sentences to avoid them. Exercise brevity in the line. As a writer, I endeavor to choose my words purposefully. I can’t ensure the reader will imagine the exact picture I paint for them, but I can do my best to paint it exactly as I myself have pictured it.
As with any writing advice, take this with a few grains of salt. It’s true most of the time, but we don’t live in a world of absolutes. Happy writing.
The Lit Wiz