Dear Writing Diary Entry #8

Infusing the 5 Senses into My Worldbuilding

In this diary entry, I go over my process for infusing all 5 human senses into my
worldbuilding and how I believe this helps bring my fantasy worlds to life on the page.

May 22, 2024

Dear Writing Diary,

Lately I've been thinking about the important role the 5 human senses have on my writing. One of my favorite things about creating stories is the worldbuilding—that is, creating the imaginary place and time in which my characters live and experience their tragedies, heartbreaks, and adventures. When I first started writing over ten years ago, I believed the most integral element in worldbuilding was imagery. Factors like describing to my readers the precise blue shade of the sky or the shape of the spires lining a castle. And while creating a picture in a reader's mind is important, lately I've found that incorporating all 5 senses into my writing makes the imaginary worlds I create feel all the more real to both me and hopefully someday, my readers.

My approach for remembering this is simple: Whenever I'm writing a scene, I write out a list of all 5 senses at the bottom of the page I’m drafting. I don't infuse all 5 into one scene, but I do make an effort to include 2-3. For example, let's say I want to write a scene describing the ocean.

1)     Sight (imagery) - A basic example of imagery in this case would be to describe what the ocean looks like:

E.g. The sea was a vibrant blue today, churning with whitecaps and
secrets.

*note: Yes, I know that you cannot see secrets, but the point of this
sentence is that it communicates the appearance of the ocean and the
mention of secrets adds a bit of intrigue, doesn't it? Perhaps, in my next diary entry, I’ll talk more about how examples like this also help make a story atmospheric. Stay tuned!

2)     Touch - For this ocean example, the first thing I would think of would be the
temperature of the water. is it warm like on a summer beach day? Or is it
freezing as if in the middle of winter?

E.g. As the sun sank beneath the waves, the water turned cold against
my feet.

3)     Taste - Luckily, I don't have much experience swallowing a lot of ocean water
but the few times I have, there’s only one word I can use to describe it: salty

E.g. The salt from my tears and the sea together mingled on my tongue

4)     Smell – In my experience, the sea most often smells like a mixture of salt and seaweed—not a very poetic description, I’m afraid. However, in this case, I might mention the aroma of things associated with the sea and the beach:

E.g. The sea breeze carried the smell of rain mixed with the fragrance of plumerias lining the coast.

5)     Sound - When I think of water, two possible sounds immediately come to mind: 1) a trickling tranquil noise or 2) the roar of the surf.

E.g. My favorite memory from the summers at the cove was waking up to the
sound of crashing waves.

Again, I rarely try to add all 5 senses to a scene because I don’t want the description to be overly detailed or slow the pacing of the story itself. Stephen King after all once said, "Description begins in the writer's imagination, but should finish in the reader's."

So as always, here's to seeing (as well as perceiving with my other 4 senses), what tomorrow holds.
-K

P.S. Whoever’s reading this, if you’ve enjoyed these glimpses into my writing life, could you please hit the subscribe button? I would love to share more of my writing journey with you in the future. :)