We’ve all heard the caveat to writers: Show, Don’t Tell. Sometimes you have to do some general telling to fill in a character’s background, but telling only goes so far and rarely brings a character vividly to life. At some point, you have to show us who the character is – through revealing action, specificity and concrete detail. For example:

That’s telling, and it’s flaccid, lazy, ineffectual writing. It relies on vague adjectives and generalizations that may mean different things to different readers or nothing at all. (She may be tall to a dwarf, for example, but not to Michael Jordan.) This is showing:

Laura Devine stood nearly six feet tall in her Ferragamo pumps, and was blessed with a curvaceous body Ruben might have painted. Her flawless face – brilliant green eyes, upturned nose, delicate chin – seemed destined for the cover of Vogue. When she shook her auburn mane or moistened her sensuous lips or smiled demurely, envy flickered in the eyes of passing women and gawking men trembled with desire. But those who were smart kept their admiration to themselves. For reasons I’ve never quite fathomed, when I commented to her on her fine looks, she slapped me hard enough to make my ears ring.

More examples:

Don’t tell us Laura is courageous. Show her protecting her child from a vicious dog, free climbing on a mountain peak, taking an unpopular stand on a controversial issue.

Don’t tell us she has fine taste. Show us the brand and style of watch she wears, the year and variety of wine she drinks, the books or CDs on the shelves in her home.

Don’t tell us she’s sensitive (or insensitive). Write her from within, by revealing her reaction to a fading sunset, an injured bird, the death of a friend. Show us.

Reveal your characters through the world they inhabit. Use all your senses in conveying your settings – sight, smell, touch, taste, sound. Do we smell a scented candle burning in Laura’s home, or bacon grease? Does she feel cool tile, fine Berber carpet, or cat litter beneath her feet? Do we hear sirens in the neighborhood, or a Bach sonata? What do these concrete and specific details reveal about her world – and about her? Immerse yourself in your character’s world, using your senses to see and feel your characters and their world. Then write it from within, bringing it all vividly to life. If the details are appropriate and convincing, the reader will forget that there’s a writer at work, become immersed in the story, and suspend disbelief. If you believe, so will the reader.

One can certainly pile on so many details that their use becomes self-conscious, plodding and annoying to the reader. Brand names here and there can be useful, for example, but a litany of them can quickly become gimmicky, detracting from the flow of the story.

In my latest Benjamin Justice mystery, Blind Eye, a dark, complicated murder mystery set against the priest sex scandal rocking the Catholic Church, I needed enough detail to take the reader into that world without serving up an encyclopedia or treatise on Catholicism. Articles, books and pamphlets provided a wealth of useful information, from the general to the specific. So did personal interviews with firsthand sources, from priests to church historians to abuse victims. I also visited churches, rectories, and the like, taking notes and gathering photographs, post cards and other documentation of the concrete and visual. Countless websites provided me with endless details for creating my characters and settings – clerical garb, religious ritual, church ornamentation, prayers, church architecture, etc. – that often suggested unexpected story material. From my smorgasbord of research I selected the details that felt useful and necessary.

Ultimately, you, the author, must decide how much detail serves the story best, how much is too little, how much is too much. But without sufficient detail, deftly placed, it’s unlikely you’ll bring your characters and story to life in a way that feels credible and convincing to the reader.

In one of your chapters, circle all the adjectives and adverbs. Now underline all the specific action and concrete details. How’s the balance? Are you telling or showing?