Worldwide Freelance Writer
By Jen Leo | Permalink |
3 comments | September 7th, 2005 | Trackback
You’re probably already getting the Worldwide Freelance Writer newsletter. If not, sign up, it’s FREE. As newsletters go, they can pile up in our inbox and it’s easy to ignore them. But today I thought, hey, I haven’t read WFW in a while. And I’m so glad I did.
They had an interesting article about how to make your reader get a sense of place in your writing.
“It’s My Hometown: Making the Reader Feel Like a Local,” by William Dean. It’s not online yet, but I hope they add it to their growing list of articles for the freelance writer. You could spend all day reading Writing 101.
But back to Dean’s article. He talked about going beyond the list of street names and landmarks to draw the reader into the local setting. There was, of course, the reminder to think with our senses. And a good note on NOT getting lost in too much detail.
Sure, you’ve probably already heard this stuff a million times. But I liked hearing it one more time. It is especially good to be reminded if you’re reworking a story you wrote ages ago. This is just the kind of basics that we need to make sure we’ve done when editing. Writing is rewriting. Ah yes.
Comments
The article has been posted in Writing 101 now, but I believe it’s more pertinent to fiction writing. For example: “I’ve lost count of the times readers have asked if I’d been to this place or that which I wrote about, Venice or Port Said or the deepest jungles of Africa or the Amazon. I’ve never been to any of those places, but, as I often say, a little research goes a long way.”
Let’s HOPE this is not a travel writer speaking. The last thing we need are travel writers whose journeys are totally virtual.
Good point, Jerry. But as travel writers we should also note that including street signs isn’t the only way to bring a reader in to a locale.
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Hi Jen
I was about to send you the same article. Woweee, I can post on your blog again…looks like I was banned for some time (actually a technical glitch somewhere)