It poured down buckets of rain the other evening. And as quickly as the storm approached, it was gone, leaving behind a world washed clean.
Stepping outside, Captain Cavedweller and I breathed deeply of the fresh spring air and noticed (at least one of us noticed) how intense the colors seemed after the storm as the sun once again appeared.
These tulips were the perfect collectors of rain drops. I loved how you could see the individual droplets clinging to the surface. That in itself was pretty remarkable. The story behind these tulips is pretty remarkable, too, considering these flowers came from bulbs CC’s great-grandmother brought with her when she moved across the country more than a hundred years ago.
As I was looking at the photos I snapped of the tulips it made me think about the stories we write.
Sometimes I get in such a big rush to pour out the story, I don’t stop in my writing to take time to create some beautiful, individual moments that the reader would enjoy, that would bring a greater level of depth to my novel.
Are there some beautiful little nuggets in your writing you can mine out for your readers? Instead of just writing there was a rainstorm and all is fresh and green, can you instead write about the intensity of the colors, the scent of the air, the smooth dampness of the grass beneath your feet? It is easier for the reader to become immersed in your story when you describe the way the raindrops slid down the petals of a flower, clinging in round globes of shimmering light before dripping silently onto the soft fingers of your heroine.
Take a few minutes every day to really absorb the world around you – the world you are writing about in your book. Choose one little area and see how much rich detail you can add to it.
