The Devil Is In the Details

A major character, whom I will call Uncle Charlie, is a perfect example: at no point did the author give us his age, tell us what he looked like, in fact, not a single word to describe him other than “he was jocular.”  She said he was a sea captain, but no shiny brass buttons entered his description, or a rolling gait after so many years on a ship’s deck, or the weathered, wrinkled face sailors get, or the washed-out blue eyes from a life beneath glaring sun.  I believe the author thought that designating him as a “jocular sea captain” was enough.

It wasn’t. 

Every time Uncle Charlie entered a scene, I could not picture him, could not hear his voice, conjure his face, nor smell his tobacco.  And so I never got into him, or even close to him, which had the effect of distancing me from Charlie until ultimately I did not care what fate awaited him.

It was the same with locations.  The author felt that “a small village” sufficed, when I would have loved a few more details such as cottages with thatched roofs and half-timbers, a village green with sheep grazing, chimneys with smoke, maybe a few hawthorn hedges and a rose arbor or two.  Every time the author placed her faceless characters in this vague village, I was once more uninvolved because I could not see where we were, and so I could not place myself there.

When she had them sit down to tea, that was all they did, “They sat down to tea.”  No mention of Earl Gray or Darjeeling, no raspberry tarts or buttered scones, no lovely clotted cream for the reader to salivate over.  We were not invited to taste or smell the repast and so, like uninvited guests, could not experience it.

The storyline was fabulous, however, a real page-turner with a rousing ending.  But it wasn’t enough.  Because of the omitted details, I was only an observer rather than one who took part, so that at the end I was left with a feeling of having feasted at a banquet of white bread and mayonnaise.

The old adage is true: God (or the Devil) is in the details – which is to say, success or failure.  An engineer can build an awesome bridge over a river, beautiful and strong with fantastic spans and fabulous arches, but if that engineer leaves out a few rivets here and there, the bridge will collapse.  Like rivets, details are what holds a story together and makes it a success.  And that is why I always remind beginning writers: when creating a story or novel, don’t forget the rivets.  

Or the buttered scones.

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