Would you rather eat a cupcake that has too
much frosting or no frosting at all? It comes down to personal taste, of course,
but the two situations present different problems. If you have too much frosting, you can just
wipe half of it off—but then you’ve wasted some ingredients that didn’t have to be
used in the first place. With a naked cupcake, you have to make the
frosting from scratch, but you can make sure not to whip up a sickening amount. Although you’re unlikely to face this cupcake
conundrum anytime soon, you will likely encounter scenes in your stories that need to be shaved
down and scenes that need to be built up. Overwritten scenes give us too much frosting
in terms of detail and verbiage. Underwritten scenes, with their lack of frosting,
don’t expand the details enough for the reader to fully visualize and experience the
story. Most writers lean more one way than the other,
but sometimes it varies depending on the type of information you’re trying to convey. You might tend to overwrite setting descriptions
and underwrite dialogue, or vice versa. The balance might even shift from project
to project. The key is being able to identify when you’ve
got too little or too much. Overwriting and underwriting can be applied
on a sentence level and a plot level. I’m an underwriter in terms of line editing,
in that I don’t include enough setting or sensory details in my first drafts. But I’m a massive overwriter when it comes
to plot elements and scenes; I usually try to tackle too many subplots and themes within
one story. This video will focus on overwriting and underwriting
on a sentence level. We’re examining individual cupcakes, not
the whole bakery. Taste is subjective, but it’s often easy
for readers to identify “bad” or amateurish writing, even if they can’t articulate why
it feels half-baked. An author can tell a fascinating and original
story, but if the writing fails to captivate, the reader will put the book down. Fixing problems with underwriting and overwriting
isn’t about stifling your voice to make you sound prepackaged; it’s about letting
readers know they’re in the hands of a capable storyteller. We can get a feel for each extreme by unwrapping
some hypothetical examples. Say that a story opens with a scene of a daughter
confronting her father about a letter she found. Here’s an underwritten version of that scene:
Fiona stormed into the room. Hector looked up at his daughter from his
desk. “What’s going on?” he asked. “You never told me about the letter.” He froze. “I…I don’t know about any letter.” “You just don’t want me to be happy! You hate me. You always have, because I’m not your real
daughter.” Fiona started crying, and Hector consoled
her until the tears had dried. He offered to make her some hot chocolate,
but that only seemed to make things worse. He didn’t know what to do. He had lied about the letter, and it was clear
Fiona knew that. This is obviously a bare bones draft. It’s mostly dialogue, and several key details
are missing that would be important to know for the opening of a story. We don’t have a clear picture of the setting,
and we don’t know the daughter’s age; our interpretation of the scene might change
depending on whether Fiona is six, sixteen, or twenty-six. We also have a paragraph that should be part
of the scene instead of described in summary—it’s telling instead of showing. There’s really not much flavor in terms
of imagery, atmosphere, or emotion. The writing doesn’t make me feel anything. Sometimes writers forget to take their time
with important moments—everything happens too quickly, and the reader doesn’t get
to witness the events unfold in real time. The characters are talking heads, lacking
the descriptive details that would paint them as unique individuals living in a real world. As a result, they feel like cardboard cutouts. For underwritten scenes, it can be useful
to revise with a sensory mindset, particularly visuals. Picture everything as it happens. If you were experiencing this moment yourself,
what imagery would seem most interesting or important? What smells, tastes, sounds, and tactile sensations
would you notice? How do those change the mood? What might those details reveal about the
people involved? For this scene, I might filter it entirely
through Fiona’s perspective. I could add a sensory detail, like a smell,
to transport the reader into the moment: Fiona stormed into her father’s study. As always, he sat at his ugly mahogany desk,
smoking a cigar, the stench further fueling her anger. Adding sensory details like this usually inspires
deeper characterization. Now we know that Hector smokes cigars, which
might hint at what type of man he is. Since the scene is filtered through Fiona’s
perspective, we can see her label his desk as “ugly” and the cigar smell as a “stench,”
word choices that underscore her dislike toward her father. Sometimes the scene isn’t lacking sensory
details but rather character emotion and thought. You can add a few internal reactions to deepen
the characterization and thus help the reader feel more invested in the story. The better we understand someone and sympathize
with their feelings, the more we care about what happens to them. These emotions might come in the form of body
language: Fiona slapped a white envelope on his desk
and crossed her arms. “You never told me about the letter.” Instead of body language, memories or background
information could show the relationship dynamics. “You just don’t want me to be happy,”
Fiona whispered. A vivid image flashed through her head, of
her fists pounding on the basement door, her own childlike voice crying out in the near-darkness. Hector stood from his chair and clapped a
hand on her shoulder. She turned her gaze toward the floor but didn’t
pull away. “You know that’s not true, Fiona. I want you to be safe. To make the right choices.” Remember that sensory details, actions, emotions,
and thoughts all enrich the reading experience by making the story feel three-dimensional. Now, you don’t want to overcorrect and add
too much in. That’s how you end up with an overwritten
version of this scene, like this: Fiona stormed into her father’s study. As always, he sat at his ugly mahogany desk
with its stacks of cluttered papers and shiny trinkets from Thailand and Japan and wherever
else his greedy investment business had spread like a plague. He was smoking a fat cigar, the pungent stench
further fueling her anger, like kindling to a fire. He looked up at her, his brown eyes widening
in complete shock and surprise, clearly not expecting to see her there. She wasn’t normally permitted in his study,
and she resented him all the more for that. She wasn’t a child anymore; she was nearly
seventeen now, and yet he seemed to think she needed rules and curfews, all designed
to pin her under his authoritarian thumb. Fiona strode forward and slapped a white envelope
on his desk, crossing her arms. “You never told me about this letter. Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you keep this from me? I can’t believe you’d lie like that.” He froze like a deer in headlights, stuttering
out a response. “I…I don’t know about any letter. If I had, I would’ve told you, I swear it,
darling. There’s no need to be so upset. I would never have done that to you.” “You just don’t want me to be happy,”
Fiona whispered. “You hate me. I can see it in the way you look at me. You always act like I’m some bug you want
to step on. I know it’s because I’m not your real
daughter. I’m just a foster kid. A stray you took in because you felt sorry
for me. But guess what? You don’t get to dictate my life.” Hot tears spilled over her cheeks and dripped
down her neck, into her cream-colored blouse. Fury bubbled in her chest, her throat constricting,
her heart pounding with pure rage, threatening to erupt in the form of a blazing tirade. Oh, how she wanted to give him a piece of
her mind, to make him understand how badly he had hurt her across the years, how much
he had so cruelly and terribly limited her freedom. She remembered how he had locked her in the
basement when she was ten years old and turned off all the lights, ignoring the sound of
her fists banging on the door. All that torture because she had deigned to
kiss the butcher’s son on the cheek after he had given her a free piece of honey ham,
and her father thought such a dirty peasant to be beneath his daughter. By kissing someone so lowly, she had tarnished
the family name—that’s what he thought, anyway. In this version, the descriptions are long-winded
and filled with more detail than needed to picture the scene. Also, the characters are monologuing, speaking
at length without pausing to wait for a response and without being interrupted, which doesn’t
feel realistic in this type of argument. A typical conversation has a back-and-forth
rhythm. Toward the end, we’re stuck inside the character’s
thoughts for one dense paragraph, putting the action on pause. All these features drag down the pacing and
could potentially bore the reader. Overwriting likely stems from a desire to
capture everything in a lifelike rendering and ensure the reader is clearly picturing
the scene and experiencing the characters’ emotions. But this level of detail and repetition can
actually detract from clarity by leaving the reader unsure of what to take away from the
scene. If you describe at length the paintings on
the wall, the desk, the carpeting, the curtains, and the furnishing, I might be able to picture
the setting, but it would be a slog to read through. Think of your writing as a camera lens: you
need to decide what is in the foreground (i.e., the most important or interesting element
that is focused on in detail) and what is in the background (i.e., what is not as important
and so requires less detail). A scene where everything is in focus is the
same as a scene where nothing is in focus. You could describe the furniture in less detail
as a background feature, then pull a single object into the foreground to focus on in
more detail—say, a portrait on the wall. You’re telling the reader, “Pay attention,
this is interesting.” You’re hinting at the detail’s significance
to the characters—what it says about them, what it reveals about the story world, what
narrative questions it creates. A portrait on a wall could show that an ugly
old man was once handsome, mirroring how the optimism of his youth has faded into pessimism;
it could reveal that, in this story world, everyone has a portrait of their Dear Leader
on the wall; it could make the reader ask, “Who is the woman in this portrait?” or
“Why does this dude have a creepy painting of a lion attacking a horse?” Overwriting can also be annoying because it’s
as if the writer assumes the reader won’t understand their meaning if they don’t emphasize
it enough, to the point where the reader will want to shout, “All right, I get it! Fiona is really angry!” Avoid the temptation to overexplain; instead,
let the details speak for themselves. Readers are most engaged when they’re given
clues rather than answers—when they’re shown the evidence rather than told the conclusion. With overwritten scenes, go through each sentence
and determine what new information the reader is receiving. Oftentimes, you’ll find sentences or phrases
that essentially say the same thing. Take this sentence: “He was smoking a fat
cigar, the pungent stench further fueling her anger, like kindling to a fire.” Well, “stench” means “a strong and very
unpleasant smell,” so “pungent” feels redundant because we already know the smell
is “intense.” Likewise, the reader is told that the smell
is “fueling her anger,” and the simile “like kindling to a fire” conveys that
same idea, so it’s not strictly necessary. Plus, it’s a bit of a cliché, as is “He
froze like a deer in headlights.” Look out for those clichéd expressions, especially
if you tend to overwrite on a sentence level. You can do the same repetition test with dialogue
and internal thought. Fiona says, “You never told me about this
letter. Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you keep this from me? I can’t believe you’d lie like that.” She uses four similar sentences to express
her indignation over her father keeping this letter a secret. This might be realistic in some cases, but
the repetition of ideas makes for boring dialogue. Here, it could be shortened to “Why didn’t
you tell me about this letter?” If you wanted to add extra emphasis, it could
be followed by “Why did you keep this from me?” Or if you wanted to put the focus on Fiona
taking particular offense to him lying, it could be shortened to “Why didn’t you
tell me about this letter? You lied to me.” If two sentences or paragraphs express the
same idea, cut one of them. Choose your details carefully. Think of what information or impression you
want your reader to take away from each paragraph, and question how many words you need to achieve
that. Now, how about a draft of this scene that
feels more balanced? Fiona swung open the door to her father’s
study, brandishing a white envelope. Her father looked up from his desk. A cigar dangled from his mouth, and its stench
fueled her anger. “You’re up early,” he said, one eyebrow
raised. She slapped the envelope on his desk and crossed
her arms. “Why didn’t you tell me about this letter?” “Letter? From whom?” He lowered his cigar and appraised the torn-open
envelope. “This is the first time I’ve seen it.” Fiona fought the urge to tear the cigar from
his mouth and throw it across the room. It would’ve been so satisfying to ruin his
prized French loveseat in the process. She’d always hated this room, with its gaudy
golden statues of philosophers and overlarge mahogany furniture, all designed to manipulate
guests into believing Hector Reinhard was a noble and sophisticated man. “You’re lying,” she spat, and her father
flinched. “I know you saw the letter because I found
it in your dresser drawer.” “You shouldn’t have been in my bedroom.” His admonishing expression was that of a parent
grounding a child, as if she were seven instead of seventeen. “That's not an answer.” Blood thundered in her head. She’d never felt this volume of rage, not
even when he'd put down her Pomeranian for “yapping,” not even when he'd called her
birth mother “a disgusting slut.” Fiona hadn't imagined those memories could
be trumped, but this? This was unforgivable. This scene is 239 words; the underwritten
draft was 101 words and the overwritten draft was 441 words. It’s not a perfect draft, but I’ve tried
to include more setting details and to characterize both Fiona and Hector in terms of their ages
and personalities. I wanted to show what their relationship has
been like prior to this point, since that information changes how we interpret this
scene, putting us firmly on Fiona’s side of the argument; even though we don’t yet
know the story behind the letter, Fiona’s commentary suggests that Hector is the jerk
here. I also wanted to create a sense of intrigue
about the letter’s contents—what could be worse than insulting Fiona’s birth mother
or killing her dog? Since this is a hypothetical example made
for this video and not a real story, I have no idea what’s actually in the letter. That’s part of the reason the characterization
has changed. While Fiona is always shown to be angry and
upset, Hector’s reactions have morphed across the three versions. In the underwritten version, Hector seems
kinder and more conciliatory, almost endearing. In the overwritten draft, he’s less genuine,
but he still wants to comfort his daughter. This third version shows a much crueler Hector
with an obviously toxic father-daughter relationship. So, he’s gone from possibly sympathetic
to straight-up villain across these drafts. That transformation just goes to show that
how you phrase the details and dialogue can dramatically impact how readers feel about
the characters. Keep in mind that your style doesn’t need
to stay in the Goldilocks Zone. Plenty of writers lean toward more economical
styles, and others toward lush descriptions. You’ve probably read at least one book that
bored you to tears because the writing style felt too plain or one that aggravated you
with the complexity of its prose. Sometimes, you’ll stumble across writing
that’s technically proficient, but it’s just not for you. And that’s okay. We’re all different people with different
tastes, in both reading and writing. Still, it’s important to articulate why
a style works or doesn’t work for you, because that awareness will help you when you’re
editing your own writing. In Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng,
the writing flows. This is one of the opening scenes, as read
by Jennifer Lim: …The three of them sat on the car’s roof
in order, as they had in all the family portraits that had once hung in the stairwell and were
now reduced to ash. Lexie, Trip, Moody: senior, junior, sophomore. Beside them they felt the hole that Izzy,
the freshman, the black sheep, the wild card, had left behind—though they were still certain,
all of them, that this hole would be temporary. “What was she thinking?” Moody muttered, and Lexie said, “Even she
knows she’s gone too far this time, that’s why she ran off. When she comes back, Mom is going to murder
her.” “Where are we going to stay?” Trip asked. A moment of silence unreeled as they contemplated
their situation. “We’ll get a hotel room or something,”
said Lexie finally. “I think that’s what Josh Trammell’s
family did.” Everyone knew this story: how a few years
ago Josh Trammell, a sophomore, had fallen asleep with a candle lit and burned his parents’
house down. The long-standing rumor at the high school
was that it wasn’t a candle, it was a joint, but the house had been so thoroughly gutted
there was no way to tell, and Josh had stuck to his candle story. Everyone still thought of him as that dumbass
jock who burned the house down, even though that had been ages ago, and Josh had recently
graduated from Ohio State with honors. Now, of course, Josh Trammell’s fire would
no longer be the most famous fire in Shaker Heights. No matter how you feel about the book as a
whole, it’s hard to argue that Celeste Ng is a bad writer in terms of sentence-by-sentence
construction. Many readers call Little Fires Everywhere
“beautifully written,” with one reviewer saying, “The story is brilliantly told,
Ng's bright prose glowing with warmth and wisdom.” A Goodreads reader shares, “Ng's prose flowed
with such fierce and understated intelligence that I felt immersed in her world from the
very first page,” and an Amazon user declares, “This book was so darn well-written! Just the right amount of detail without being
over written.” And even reviewers who disliked the story
felt the writing was good. You don’t need to have “beautiful” prose
to be a good writer. A simple and accessible style can immerse
readers just as much as an embellished and multi-layered one. Find what you like and admire in a writing
style, then polish your prose until your readers feel what you want them to feel. Don’t worry about underwriting or overwriting
when you’re squeezing out the words. Your first draft is allowed to suck. As the saying goes, “Write without fear;
edit without mercy.” Take time between drafts, even if it’s just
an hour, but preferably a few days or weeks. Waiting a few months is great when it comes
to editing, because you’re less emotionally attached to your ideas and the words feel
less familiar, enabling you to objectively notice flaws in the writing. Sometimes it’s frustrating when celebrated
authors like Tolkien or George R.R. Martin get away with dense paragraph after dense
paragraph, yet newer writers are skewered for writing in similar detail. That’s why feedback from a variety of readers
is so important. All readers have different tastes, but if
three people who write or read in your genre point out the same problems in your writing,
then you need to take that advice to heart if you want other readers to enjoy your work. Self-editing is hard because we all have blind
spots, so other writers can teach us novel ways to refine our craft. As a writing exercise, intentionally underwrite
or overwrite a scene. Analyze what makes it “bad” writing, and
figure out how to fix the mess you’ve made. How much frosting do you like on your cupcakes? Are you more of an underwriter or an overwriter? How do you fix these problems? Tell me all about it in a comment. Whatever you do, keep writing.
