First, I have a gift for you, just for visiting my blog. The Ultimate Guide to Dialogue Punctuation.

One of the most common places in which we show character emotion is interspersed between the character's words, within paragraphs of dialogue, or between his or her thoughts. But if we don't format these paragraphs correctly, readers can become confused as to which parts are the character's spoken words, which parts are thoughts, and which are actions. And if you confuse readers, you lose readers.

This easy-to-follow guide will walk you through all the grammar rules associated with dialogue, thoughts, interruptions, etc. So, you can craft dialogue and actions that keep readers focused on what's happening in the story and how your character feels, instead of on errors you might be accidentally creating in the dialogue.

And be sure to read to the end of this post, so you won't miss this week's Power-Up, a super practical action step you can use in your story right now.

If you've been writing or studying the craft of writing for any time, you've probably run across the saying, "Show, don't tell." What does this mean? Well, it means that we want to show the reader—with the character's actions and interactions, dialogue, and description—how the character feels or other aspects of the story, rather than just point blank telling the reader what we want to convey.

In terms of character emotion, there are several levels that can take us from telling the reader how the character feels to showing and helping the reader experience that emotion with the character. The first two levels are types of telling. The last two are showing.

Level 1

This involves stating the emotion outright or using -ly adverbs that do so. This is telling at its most blatant. I often call this emotion-naming, as a sort of shorthand for it.

Example 1: She was too frightened to speak.

Notice, we're using the weak verb was to connect she and frightened. There's no action in this sentence. Frightened is naming the emotion outright.

Example 2: “Wh-who are you?” she asked fearfully.

Well, we have some dialogue there, and we see her stammering, which indicates either nervousness or something else going on with the character. But fearfully is an -ly adverb that names her emotion.

Level 2

This one is a little better, but it's still telling. This occurs when we pair the named emotion with a physical sensation.

Example: Fear clogged her throat.

This is figurative language. Fear isn't physical, so it can't really clog her throat. What happens is, her throat closes up because she's afraid. While this is a little more creative, it's still telling. We're still naming that emotion, saying to the reader that she was afraid. We do have a little internal physical response going on, but it's cliche and isn’t very descriptive.

Level 3

Here, we get into showing the emotion, through body language or internal physical response.

Example: She backed away, her constricted throat closing off the screen building inside it.

This example conveys a similar concept to the Level 2 example, in which fear clogged her throat. This time, though, we're showing the internal physical response: her constricted throat. First, we have body language: She backed away. That indicates she doesn't want to be near whatever it is she's backing away from. Then, her body does something involuntary, the throat constriction.

This internal response also prevents a scream that was building, so we can see that she wants to scream, but she's too frightened. This harkens back to our first example for Level 1, in which she was too frightened to speak. This Level 3 version is more powerful because she can't even scream, and we’re using an internal physical response to show this.

Level 4

In level four, we use a metaphor for the emotion, through the use of setting, description, and word choice during the character's action. In this way, the reader truly shares the character's emotion.

By the way, a metaphor is a word or phrase that is used to describe something to which it is normally not related, in order to suggest a resemblance and increase the power of the description. Metaphors evoke emotion in the reader and can give an ordinary story element an extraordinary meaning.

What do I mean by all this? Well, let's look at an example.

Example: As she backed away, cold air from the vent above whispered down her neck.

Here, she is backing away, which is an example of body language, but instead of an internal physical response, we have a part of the setting contributing to the mood: the cold air.

We often think of cold in relation to fear or something scary. And the cold air whispered down the back of her neck. Imagine a person whispering and their breath touching the back of your neck. It gives you that shivery type feeling, and it creates an image of discomfort, probably extremediscomfort.

This is a metaphor because it's relating fear to the cold air from the vent. Now, a vent isn't dangerous. It's not going to cause her any harm, and that air is soft. And whispering is a soft sound, but it's not just the sound that evokes the emotion. It's the sensation down the back of her neck. This makes us feel her fear with her.

Then, if she asks the question from Level 1, “Wh-who are you?" her stammering emphasizes the fear even more. So, we’ve paired an action beat (her backing away) and setting description (the air whispering) with the dialogue for a powerful depiction of her emotion.

What is an action beat? Those are sentences of character action that are interspersed between lines of that character's dialogue, in the same paragraph. The Ultimate Guided Dialogue Punctuation will show you more about that.

For the purposes of today's writer coaching session, we're going to mostly focus on Level 3 (where we use body language or internal physical response), but we'll also touch on using setting and character interactions with it to show emotion.

HINT: To determine whether you're telling or showing the character's emotion, examine whether the wording indicates the character's physical or mental response to that emotion. If it doesn’t, it's probably telling, and I would suggest revising.

The first category of tips for showing character emotion will center around using the character's body language, internal physical responses, and actions. Here are a few definitions to get us started.

Actions

When I talk about actions, I'm referring to outward expressions of the character's emotion through that person's physical interactions with the setting, other characters, or objects, plus any other types of action.

Example: She wrapped the blanket tighter around her shoulders.

A character might also throw a book across the room, slump into a chair, slam a door, slap someone on the back…You get the picture.

Body Language

Body language refers to movements or gestures the character makes in response to the emotion. This is usually voluntary or, at least, a conscious act—the character actively makes his/her body do the thing—though sometimes these can be involuntary. These are outward actions that any character can see if they're observing.

The character may roll her eyes, square his shoulders, wring her hands, cross her arms, shake her head, etc.

Internal Physical Responses

Internal physical responses occur when part of the character's body responds to the emotion involuntarily. Most often, internal physical responses are not visible to other characters.

This is the throat closing up, heart pounding, a chill running down her back, breaking out into a cold sweat…

You might say, that last one is external. Sort of, yes, since other characters may be able to see it, but it is an involuntary reaction caused by the body’s internal response. The character didn’t (and can’t) make her body sweat. Similarly, a character may blush, and that is both internal and external in the way that other characters can see it, while it is an involuntary action.

Advantages to This technique

What's the advantage to using action, body language, and internal physical responses to convey emotion? Well, they all move the story forward.

They convey motion, either within the character (if it's an internal physical responses) or via the character moving through the setting and interacting with it. Or this could be the character simply moving his or her body (making a gesture, shaking her head, etc.) Each form of movement keeps the reader grounded in what's happening in the story outside the character's head and often will relate to the plot, especially if it's an interaction with the setting or an action.

Example: A character might rush outside, slam the door and take off on his motorcycle. This character is probably angry or upset, which can move the character arc or relationship development forward. It also advances the plot, making readers wonder where's he going to end up and what's going to happen next.

These methods keep the reader grounded in the setting, keep the characters moving, provide an action piece for a scene that may otherwise not have one, and keep the characters active rather than passive.

This Technique in Practice

Depending on whether you're showing the emotions of your viewpoint character or a different character, you’ll need to use specific methods and avoid others.

For our second group of tips, we're going to explore how to use a character's words and thoughts to show emotion. Your Ultimate Guide to Dialogue Punctuation will come in handy for this part.

Mirroring the Emotion

We can use strong dialogue or internal monologue, (a character's thoughts) that conveys or hints atthe emotion.

Example 1 (dialogue): “Oh, sure. Give the tickets to her.”

The emphasis on her indicates the emotion. This character is not happy about the situation.

Example 2 (internal monologue): “I see.” Forcing a smile, I turned away. He chose Sarah? After everything I've done for him?

The internal monologue is in italics.

Both of these examples convey the same sentiment. This character is not happy the guy gave his tickets to this other girl, and we may infer that there's some jealousy going on here. Each of these versions can be quite powerful and valid, just depending on what the scene needs and what your personal style preferences are.

Contrasting the Emotion

We can also use contrasting dialogue or tone. Dialogue that contradicts the character's internal response or body language can be a powerful clue to emotion. This is called subtext. It is powerful because it’s authentic and subtle. We often say the opposite of how we feel to mask our true emotions.

If you are depicting the emotions of someone who is not the viewpoint character, you can use the person’s appearance or facial expression. And for any character, you can use action and setting to create a mood that shows the character's true feelings.

Example: “If that's what you want,” he said, softening his voice, but the steel in his eyes turned to flint. The sparks they fired off could set a forest ablaze.

In this example, the character is claiming to be fine with the situation, and he softens his voice so he doesn't sound angry. However, the expression in his eyes tells the viewpoint character all she needs to know.You could just as easily use actions or other types of body language, like a clinched fist, to convey the emotion the character is trying to hide with his mild dialogue.

For our third group of tips, let’s look at how to use setting and description to convey character emotion.

Use strong descriptive verbs that hint at or contrast the mood.

These verbs are active and descriptive.

Example: He trudged across the pristine lawn.

You might be thinking, if he's experiencing something negative enough to weigh him down, trudgeddoesn't contrast that emotion. It conveys it. That's true. And trudged is quite descriptive of how he's walking. He's not just strolling across the lawn. It's a slow, almost painful type of walking, as if it takes extreme effort to make himself move. This conveys a negative emotion, exhaustion, or something similar.

The contrasting description here is the pristine lawn. This lawn is beautiful, well-kept, and in prime condition, and his mood is very much the opposite of that. So, pairing trudged with the description of the lawn shows the contrast of the setting to his mood.

Caution: Using strong, descriptive verbs to mask emotion-naming is still telling. Remember our example from Level 1: “Fear clogged her throat”? Well, clogged is pretty descriptive, but we're naming the fear, so this is still a form of telling.

When we look at these all together, we can see that this really is weaker writing.

Use specific setting details as part of the action that mirror or contrast the emotion.

A cold wind, dark skies, or a messy room can reflect a character's foul mood. A perfect spring day can contrast a character's depressed mood. Singing birds can create a discordant sound that hurts the character's ears.

In one episode of the popular TV series Yellowstone, we find an excellent example of this. One of the characters who is…well, easily angered…has just finished an argument with someone or was at least upset with this person, and she walks outside to sit on the porch and brood. This lovely wind chime starts tinkling nearby. It's hanging from the roof of the porch, and she glares at it for a moment. Then, she gets up and walks inside. The door bangs behind her. She comes back out with a rifle and shoots the wind chime! (It was contrasting her mood so badly that she couldn't stand it.) She sits down, laying the gun next to her, and a bird starts singing nearby. Well, she shoots the bird, too!

This is not only a great example of using setting to contrast, and thus reveal, a character’s emotion. It also conveys aspects of the character’s personality at the same time. When a description, action, or piece of dialogue can accomplish multiple purposes, we win as writers!