all this helpful advice, I love it. I hope it never stops. I'm going to have to read the hunger games now. As for sentence structure that's just going to take practice I guess.
I found this book on Amazon called writing emotions. It shows you how to "show" emotions and not "tell" them. I get confused as well, a lot, so don't feel bad
Just keep in mind that The Hunger Games is written in first person point of view, so that actual writing techniques are different from the standard third person. However, there's still a lot of good concepts and plot arrangement that can be learned from it.
Heey, just a quick input from me. I understood the first paragraph perfectly, even without the telling part. However, the punctuation of your writing made me cringe a little. Someone said you have the urge to tell too much, and you think the same. I don't think this is (completely) correct. It is not that you tell too much, but that you have low expectations of your readers. Your readers do have imagination as well, and most of them probably read fantasy before. Their understanding is higher than you might think. Also, I agree with people saying that spells should be capitalized, especially if they resemble 'normal' words.
Speaking of Hunger Games and telling instead of showing, I thought most of the first half of the second book was horrendous because I felt so disconnected from the story, it seemed like almost pure telling with very little showing, and disallowed me to really care about any of the characters about half way through.
I have to agree that both showing and telling have their uses. However, depending on the pacing you want, telling might need to be brief in some situations. In the end, if it flows and reads well then it's okay. Succinctness is a skill you'd benefit in honing, though. Many times, fewer words say more to the reader. Gotta learn to 'cut the fat' as William Strunk puts it.
Hi, I had trouble understanding your paragraph even after reading your explanation. There are punctuation problems as well as the confusion over some words that are nouns instead of verbs, and some of the time I can't assign actions to particularl characters. "It was that warping spell! frost beam made her aether sluggish but, perphaps. I cast dilute sending a stream of water aether into her weeve. Her spell needed pure fire aether to work, with the water in her weeve I thought she would abort the move. But she didn't, her inexperience showing. She attempted to cast the spell It miss weaved and instead of teleporting her away to safty it warped her right in front of where the slashing vines were rooted." My view on how this might flow better is: "It was the warping spell that undid her. My frost beam made her aether sluggish. Although maybe it was my cast of dilute, sending a stream of water aether into her weave that caused her to make the mistake. Her spell needed pure fire aether to work. So with water in her weave I thought she would abort it. But she didn't, her inexperience showing through. She attempted to cast the spell, it miss-weaved and instead of warping her away to safety it warped her directly in front of the slashing vines." As to the show and tell, its a judgement thing. You have to use both. In part this is to carry the narrative. Sometimes its simply easier and quicker to say something like 'he felt jealous' than it is to try and show the facial expressions etc of jealousy. But you also need to both show and tell for your readers. Some of them will prefer to be told of internal dialogue, because they can relate directly to how the character feels. Some readers on the other hand will be more visual and they will want to 'see' the scene in their mind, so showing will work better for them. Use both, hope that you've got the balance right to move the story along and satisfy the readers' wants, and don't ever expect that all your readers are going to be happy with your choices. As they say, you can please some of the people some of the time. Cheers, Greg.
From my experience, showing becomes more easier once you get used to it. You'll know where to show your work and tell once you keep practicing. In the meantime, depending on your level of talent, you'll be able to show throughout the entire project without telling any single emotion a character may have.
Perhaps your story should start with an introduction, a page or two explaining your world and the magic within it to the reader. I find that if I read a story involving a complex system of magic where the author absolutely refuses to tell anything rather than show it, then I get very confused and end up quitting the book before I'm a quarter way through it.
