The Mystery Starts Here

When you finish writing your mystery and start re-writing, do you check to make sure you’ve used the five senses?

We all know what they are: sight, touch, taste, smell and hearing. Most writers us sight and hearing primarily and sometimes touch. Your work will be richer if you can use smells and tastes, too. We ’see’ a lot in books. Beautiful women, tall buildings, the ocean at dawn, but how many writers tell me that the beautiful woman’s clothes smelled like she just took them out of the dryer? Maybe she smells of some exotic and expensive perfume. Now you’ve described two very different women by their scent. When your hero touches her elbow does he feel the nubby fabric of her suit? How about the roughness of her working-class elbows? we know immediately that she’s not only that she might be tight on funds, but also that she has more important things to do with her money than to worry about her elbows.

How about when a woman rushes to the train station to meet her long-lost lover. They kiss and she tastes coffee, or bourbon or peppermint, or God forbid garlic. How is she going to react? It makes a difference. Perhaps he smells of cordite! Or something darker, brassier, that coppery smell of dried blood.

It’s fun to come up with unusual ways to describe the five senses. Instead of saying, “Tom Barton had the sprinkler going, watering his lawn.” we say, “I heard the kissing sound of a sprinkler.” Can you hear it? How about this one, “His words came out low and rough, like pebbles from a rusty tin can.” Want to show how scared a young boy is? “Freckles stood out on his face like chunks of coal on a mound of snow.” Or “The night was dark and beautiful, like diamonds on black velvet.” Yes, those last two are from my books - and I must say I rather like them.

It’s a mystery to me why more writers don’t use all five senses.

Early in my career, I belonged to a critique group that got together twice monthly. It was great for me as a beginning because, I really didn’t know what the heck I was doing! Oh, I took classes, read books and wrote and wrote and wrote. But the beauty of a critique group is feedback. Your fellow critiquers can spot those spelling errors, those holes in logic and wacky character discrepancies. Yup, they’re great for that. I learned a lot from my first group – we all did because we were all beginners and we helped one another. And there lies the rub.

Be especially wary of groups that are harsh in their judgment. I’ve heard of more than one writer who gave up because of the group’s cruel criticism and stopped writing. That’s sad. So if you find yourself in a group that’s not working for some reason, quit! Don’t worry about hurt feelings. This is your career we’re talking about! Find another group or start your own, but for heaven’s sake, don’t stop writing. One thing that has always puzzled me – and maybe someone out there in cyber-land can help. Why don’t men join critique group????? I’d really like to know!