I remember reading the first page of a manuscript that waxed eloquent about how the warmth of the sun felt on the back of the protagonist’s hands as she drove down a quiet early morning lane, the way the taste of the sumptuous strawberry she’d eaten for breakfast lingered on her tongue, how the coolness of the steering wheel beneath her palms made her shiver with delight . . . and that’s about all I remember because by then all I could think about was how refreshing a nice little catnap would be. Sure, sensory details are important, but there’s a method to choosing which ones that will draw in the reader, as opposed to drawing their interest to a quick close. Want to know what it is? I’ve the pleasure of laying it out on the fabulous website, Writing Forward. Check it out!
Sound advice. I’m not fond of reading material overdone with sensory details, so why do I insist on putting them in my own drafts? Maybe it’s so I can have a good cry when all those darlings are deleted later on? (And some of them are just so darling.)
Heavy doses of sensory details worked for some of the olden day masters with works 500 pages-plus. Going back to a previous WFS post on Moby Dick, I wonder if in today’s world Mr. Melville wouldn’t gear himself more to 250-300 pages, and a lot of the paring probably via dumping sensory details.