I received criticism for telling and not showing in one of my recent stories. I did ask a question on here about it a couple of months ago and received some great and useful replies from the community.
I am now in the process of editing my story but now I feel as though I am showing to much? Is it possible to show to much in a story? I don't really know where to draw the line. There is a part in my story where my character sees the new home she is living in and so I have gone on to describe what the cottage looks like, smells like etc. Which I think is ok but another example would be when my characters are sitting down at a kitchen table and having a discussion, do I need to describe the table? The kitchen? etc..
I just think that it sounds silly if it is described to much. Help please?
Yes you can over show Go with what John says....
wish you good luck :)
There is nothing wrong with descriptive narrative. The thing with 'show and not tell' is more to do with allowing the reader to experience through the characters eyes, their emotions etc rather than being told what to expect. For example, in my book I have a character that is a chicken. She is the head peck and has stopped laying. She is nervous that she is about to be taken away by the farmer and sent to her 'pasture time'. That last sentence is akin to the writer telling the reader that the head peck is nervous.
She is nervous.
Showing this, on the other hand, would be to have the hen in the coop, surrounded by tense silence from the other hens, and waiting for the farmer to arrive. The hen near the door announces the farmer is coming and rather than state that the poor head peck is nervous, we see her sit up, and scratching her claws on the wooden boards. Through this action we can feel for ourselves the anxiety she feels.
This action shows her nervousness.
Basically, tell through narrative and show through action. This is one aspect, I suspect there might be a few more.