Writing Tip #5: Forty Below

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January in Minnesota. Cold? You betcha.

 

As I was driving to work in a windchill of -40°F today, I tried to figure out how I would describe the cold I was experiencing in a novel. How could I transport someone sitting on a beach in sunny CA to the frigid Midwest in the middle of a polar vortex? And, even more importantly, how could I do it without pages and pages of description spread in a smothering heap on top of my interesting characters and fascinating plot?

 

First, I thought of all of the cliches: The snow crunched under my feet as I rushed to my car. My breath was visible in a frosty cloud in front of me. I huddled deeper into my heavy down coat. These are all true, but we’ve heard them a thousand times. If it’s cold in a book, it’s guaranteed the characters will see their breath. It’s an easy tactic for writers, a quick setting description. And it's definitely better than using adjectives like “cold,” “freezing,” or “frigid.”

 

However, I kept searching for a way to allow my unsuspecting readers to share in my pain this morning, convinced that no casual cliches could depict my agony. Huddled there in my car as I slipped and slid on the icy roads, I wasn’t paying attention to my breath. Instead I cursed at the frozen steering wheel stinging my hands even through my gloves, forcing me to drive with my wrists in order to touch it as little as possible. When it gets this cold, you can’t touch anything outside, especially metal and plastic. My cheap thrift-store gloves weren’t cutting it.

 

Surprisingly, I’ve never read about the sensation of not being able to touch the steering wheel before, even though it happens every winter. Not once. And though I’m sure I’ll get plenty of emails with examples to prove me wrong, it’s a rare enough detail that it still feels fresh in comparison to the frosty breath.

 

You might not know what details would stand out to you riding on the back of a dragon, or sitting on a dock at twilight realizing he isn’t coming, or pulling back your leg to make that game-winning soccer kick. However, it’s worth searching for that one, fresh detail that throws your reader right into the world of your story. Enough of those in one book, and you don’t need pages and pages of description to create a rich world around your characters.

 

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some new gloves to buy.