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Layering in the description will help your readers engage in the story and keep them turning the pages. Now, there are common errors to avoid. Ask an agent and an acquisitions editor what mistakes they see in beginners' manuscripts. The most common one is the authors describing the setting of their stories. In truth, that's the last way to grab the reader by the throat from the get-go. So don't start with the setting. 

 

In his book The Art of War for Writers, James Scott Bell, a great novelist and writing teacher, says of readers: "They read to worry. They read because they want their emotions wrenched by a character's plight to whom they feel emotionally connected. You do the connecting. You start connecting from paragraph one." So that is from James Scott Bell. The setting is essential, don't think otherwise. But we've all been sent napping by novels whose covers and titles promise to transport us and yet begin with some variation of the house sat in the deep woods surrounded by et cetera. 

 

Readers have little patience for description. Research shows they often skip it to get to the action, the story, and the plot. 

 

So how should you describe the setting? Like any other reader, I like to get an immediate feel for where things are and where we are – where they take place. Many do it as a separate element at the beginning and feel the need for every scene in a different setting. But good writers know to make description part of the narrative, part of the story. It'll become almost invisible because mentions of what things look, feel, and sound like will register in the theater of the readers' minds. But they'll concentrate on the action, dialog, tension, drama, and conflict to keep them turning the pages. Ultimately, they won't remember how you worked in everything they needed to enjoy the experience fully. 

 

But consider these setting examples... 

 

The first describes the setting of a story before starting the action. It reads like this. "London in the 1860s was a cold, damp, foggy city crisscrossed with cobblestone streets and pedestrians carefully dodging the droppings of steeds that pulled all manner of public conveyances. One such pedestrian was Lucy Knight, a beautiful, young, unattached woman in a hurry to get to Piccadilly Circus. An eligible bachelor had asked her to meet him there." Now, I shouldn't have to inform you that such an opening is all telling, no showing. And that the question of how to describe the setting has been answered but not correctly. Now that's a perfect example of how not to do it – description as a separate element, all telling to set the scene. 

 

Now it isn't bad writing, and it was evocative. You got a picture of what London looked like back then. But instead of describing the setting by layering it into the story, I would like you to do this. Begin with a flush left the location and date tag in italics. So flush left on the page above the first paragraph of your first chapter in italics, you put London's West End, 1862. Then start the story this way: 

 

"Lucy Knight misstepped around clumps of horse dung as she hurried towards Regent Street. 'Must not be late,' she told herself. 'What would he think?' She carefully navigated the cobblestones as she crossed to hail a Hansom Cab, which she preferred for its low center of gravity and smooth turning. Lucy did not want to appear as if she's been tossed about in a carriage. Especially tonight. 'Not wearing a ring, I see,' the driver said as she boarded. 'I beg your pardon?' 'Nice looking lady like yourself out alone after dark in the cold fog.' 'You needn't worry about me, sir. I'm only going to the circus.' 'Piccadilly it is, ma'am.'"

 

First, that location tag, which, as I said, is placed flush left before the first paragraph, saves us a lot of narration that can be better used to let the story emerge. 

Although the second sample I wrote is more extended because we're not telling, we're showing; the reader learns everything about the character from the action and dialog rather than just being told through description.

 

Incorporating description that way, showing rather than telling, can revolutionize your writing. Description that causes readers to skip it or lose interest in your story altogether stands alone as a separate element. The antidote, layering it in and making the action include the description. Whether a novel or a nonfiction book.