In this training, I’m going to show you how mastering interiority will help you craft a story with depth that engages the reader from start to finish.

Here’s where we’re going:

1. Why Do people still read books?

2. What is Interiority? Why is It Important?

3. Case Studies: What Does Interiority Look Like?

4. How Interiority Can Add Depth to Our Stories

5. Case Study: External vs Internal

6. Q/A

1. Why Do People Still Read Books?

We still read books for many reasons

-      To have fun and be entertained

-      To escape our daily reality and routines

-      To experience something new and different

-      To see how someone else deals with conflict

-      To have a specific emotional experience

But with all the entertainment options we have today, why are books so popular

Novels are the only storytelling medium that invites us into someone’s mind and allow us to follow along as they make sense of what’s happening to them and around them

As the character makes sense of what’s happening, so does the reader

This kind of “on the page” processing is what it means to write interiority. And if you leave it out, readers are going to feel cheated.

If you want to write stories that move readers, and create lasting emotional resonance, you have to become a master at writing interiority.

You need to show readers how your character is reacting to what’s happening, or how the events of the scene are affect your character.

This is what will help you evoke emotional reactions in readers, and give them the reading experience they’re looking for.

How to Write Emotional Reactions

#1. You can tell readers how your character feels

Many writes do tell readers what their character is feeling. For example, “Maggie feels sad.”

But, as readers, we have no idea why Maggie is feeling that way. We might know something “bad” happened, but why is Maggie sad, specifically.

Also, how would you show an increase in the severity of their sadness, just using words?

#2. You can use body language and Physical Tells

But this is tricky, because a lot of emotions can be felt internally, without any visible signs.

Emotion can also be shown via body language or physical tells without a person being consciously aware of that emotion too.

This can lead to readers (and other characters) misinterpreting your character’s emotions.

Jane’s eyes were dull and lifeless. She felt pain in her chest, despite her sluggish heartbeat. Her body felt like it was going to collapse on itself.

Do you know what Jane is feeling? Jane has dull and lifeless eyes and she feels like her body is going to collapse in on itself, but …

We have no idea what any of this means, or what Jane is actually feeling. We don’t understand the source of these feelings.

Physical reactions are visually helpful, but they barely convey what a character is feeling at the moment – especially if their emotions are complex.

It’s also super easy to reply too much on cliches or slip into melodrama when you use too much body language, sensations, or physical tells.

This is why body language can only go so far – and it’s why you shouldn’t rely too much on body language or physical tells to convey emotions.

#3. You can convey character emotions via interiority.

This is the fastest, most effective way you can get readers to connect with your POV characters.

Being privy to someone’s inner life makes us feel connected to them!

Especially because, as readers, it feel like we’re the only ones who knows these private things.

Most of the manuscripts I edit lack interiority.

A novel that simply describes ‘what happened when’ is going to fall flat.

It doesn’t matter how dramatic the events are.

Without a sense of the why, readers won’t have a reason to keep turning pages.

Plus, without the right balance of interiority versus action, your characters will not behave believably.

Interiority Key Points

Interiority includes your character’s emotion - and the processing of that emotion

Definition: Interiority is the on-the-page access to a protagonist’s thoughts and feelings as they process information

“On-the-page” access means readers get direct access to the protagonist’s conscious and unconscious mind as they process info.

-      Conscious mind: memories, impressions, opinions, questions, etc. that are occurring within the protagonist’s awareness

-      Unconscious mind: repressed memories, automatic reactions, etc. that are happening outside the protagonist’s awareness

What does “Process Information” mean?

Information can be pretty much anything – it’s the “action” part of the action-reaction equation:

-      Protagonist sees a dog

-      Protagonist meets their new neighbor

-      Protagonist receives a phone call

-      Protagonist asks someone to be a movie extra

-      Protagonist is interrupted during a big test

How Do We Process Information?

a character’s unconscious emotional makeup

including biases, curiosities, fears, inner obstacles, desires, & blind spots

gives rise to involuntary

memories, urges, preferences, sensations,  associations, instincts

which contributes to their conscious

opinions, realizations, epiphanies, assumptions, judgements, evaluations

which leads to next level conscious reactions like

questions, plans, anticipations, recalculations, fantasizing, projections

Key Point: Interiority is always biased and partial

As readers, we interpret interiority very differently from neutral information

If your protagonist is neutral (and if their interiority is neutral) your story will put readers to sleep – it’ll make the story boring

Interesting people are biased! They have opinions, values, preferences, wounds, unique world-views tec.

Interiority Key Points

Interiority includes your character’s emotion - and the processing of that emotion

Narration can be neutral, interiority is always partial/biased/subjective

To determine whether a narrative passage is interiority or not, ask:

-      Could a camera capture what’s happening (and could anyone in the world view it and report accurately what’s going on)?

-      Is the passage neutral

If ‘yes’ to both questions, it’s narration, not interiority

Examples:

1. We were still sailing north, almost half a day off course on the route to Dem – No (fact)

2. All four of them stared at me as silence stretched over the ship, leaving only the sound of the wind sliding over the canvas sails above us. They were baiting me, pulling at my edges to see what I was made of. And I couldn’t blame them. Interiority (impression/evaluation)

3. He snapped his fingers and the coin flew into the air, over the side, before it fell into the water below. No (neutral movement, description)

4. They were trying to put me in my place. Trying to degrade me. Because with traders, everything was a test. Interiority (assumption, judgement)

Examples:

1. Mama Agba’s weathered voice breaks through the silence. Interiority (impression)

2. A collective exhale echoes from the fifteen other girls who weren’t chosen. No (neutral description, movement)

3. With each step, I focus on the way my bare feet drag across the reeds of Mama Agba’s floor, testing the friction I’ll need to win this match, and finally graduate. Interiority (evaluation, calculation)

4. When I reach the black mat that marks the arena, Yemi is the first to bow. No (neutral description, movement)

Examples:

1. The tramples snow coating the road into out village was speckled with brown and black from passing carts and horses. No (neutral description)

2. The weapons on her – gleaming and wicked – were enough to make me swallow. And stop a good two feet away. Interiority (instinct)

3. My stomach turned. Behind us, my sisters seemed so fragile – their pale skin infinitely delicate and shredable. Against the martax, we’d never stand a chance. Interiority (evaluation/calculation)

4. My father was dozing in his chair, his cane laid across his gnarled knee. No (neutral description)

Examples:

1. Catelyn’s bath was always warm and steaming, and her walls warm to the touch. The warmth reminded her of Riverrun, of the days in the sun with Lysa and Edmure, but could never abide the heat. Interiority (Memory)

2. He fingered the collar of his order; a heavy chain tight around the neck beneath his robe, each link forges with a different metal. No (neutral)

3. Ned glanced helplessly around the bedchamber. Catelyn’s heart went out to him, but she know she could not take him in her arms just then. First, the victory must be won, for her children’s sake. Interiority (urge, instinct)

4. Catelyn tensed at the mention of the name. Ned felt the anger within her, and stepped away. Interiority (reaction/assumption)

Interiority Key Points

Interiority includes your character’s emotion - and the processing of that emotion

Narration can be neutral, interiority is always partial/biased/subjective

Interiority requires narration; but not all narration requires interiority

Frequently asked question: Is this the same as POV?

Nope! How much access you give readers to a character’s psyche does not depend on the stylistic POV choice. You won’t write more or less interiority depending on the POV you’ve chosen to write in. POV is a stylistic choice. Interiority is about access to the character’s thoughts and feelings.

Why Does Interiority Matter?

Interiority is so important!

-      Effective interiority established focus. It reveals who or what a character is paying attention to in private.

-      Effectivity interiority establishes motive. It reveals why a character is focused on someone or something. Or why they’re doing or saying something (or not).

-      Effective interiority establishes intensity. It reveals how much attention a character is paying to someone or something. It can show intensity growing or changing.

-      Effective interiority can reveal how trusting a character really is (on the inside) vs. how they act. It can help you show how trust changes over time.

-      Effective interiority can reveal a character’s expectations of what will happen (both before and after a conflict occurs).

-      Effective interiority establishes what you character wants to be kept private, so that when the private thing becomes public, tension arises and stakes are raised.

Interiority Key Points

Interiority includes your character’s emotion - and the processing of that emotion

Narration can be neutral, interiority is always partial/biased/subjective

Interiority requires narration; but not all narration requires interiority

Everything excluding dialogue is not automatically interiority )Some is just narration)

Example: “An Ember in the Ashes” by Sabaa Tahir (italics indicated for interiority passages):

“Get the boy out of here.” The Mask doesn’t give Nan a second glance. “And burn this place down.”

He turns to me then, and I wish I could fade like a shadow into the wall behind me. I wish for it harder than I’ve ever wished for anything, knowing all the while how foolish it is. The soldiers flanking me grin at each other as the Mask takes a slow step in my direction. He holds my gaze as if he could smell my fear, a cobra enthralling its prey.

         “No, please, no. Disappear, I want to disappear.

         The Mask blinks, some foreign emotion flickering across his eyes – surprise or shock, I can’t tell. It doesn’t matter. Because in that moment, Darin leaps from the floor.

While I cowered, he loosed his bindings. His hands stretched out like claws as he lunges for the Mask’s throat. His range lends him a lion’s strength, and for a second, he is every inch our mother, honey hair glowing,

Mouth twisted in a feral snarl. 

         The Mask backs into the pool of blood near Nan’s head, and Darin is on him, knocking him to the ground, raining down blows. The legionnaires stand frozen in disbelief and then come to their senses, surging forward, shouting and swearing. Dain pulls a dagger free from the Mask’s belt before the legionnaires tackle him.

         “Laia,” my brother shouts, “Run-.”

         Don’t run, Liai, help him. fight.

         But I think of the Mask’s cold regard. Of the violence in his eyes. I’ve always loves dark-haired girls. He will rape me. Then he will kill me.

         I shudder and back into the hallway. No one stops me. No one notices me.

         “Laia,” Darin cries out, sounding like I’ve never heard him. Trapped. He told me to run, but I screamed like that, he would come. He would never leave me. I stop.

         Help him, Laia, a voice orders in my head. Move.

         And another voice, more insistent, more powerful.

         You can’t save him. Do what he says. run.

         Flame flickers at the edge of my vision, and I smell smoke. One of the legionnaires has started torching the house. In minutes the fire will consume it.

         Bind him properly this time, and get him into an interrogation cell. The Mask removes himself from the fray, rubbing his jaw. When he sees me backing down the hallway, he goes strangely still. Reluctantly, I meet his eyes, and he tilts his head.

         “Run, little girl,” he says.

         My brother is still fighting, and his screams slice through me. I know then that I will hear them over and over again, echoing in every hour of every day until I am dead or make it right. I know it.

         Abd still, I run.

On the outside, Laia is:

-      Being interrogated by The Mask, in her own home

-      Standing in a room/hallway next to her family members

On the inside, Laia is

-      Wishing she could disappear

-      Terrified of what the masks could do to her

-      Trying to muster the courage to help her brother

-      Realizing her house will burn down in a matter of minutes

-      Interpreting he brother’s behaviors, words, actions – and the Mask’s

Interiority Key Points

Interiority includes your character’s emotion - and the processing of that emotion

Narration can be neutral, interiority is always partial/biased/subjective

Interiority requires narration; but not all narration requires interiority

Everything excluding dialogue is not automatically interiority (Some is just narration)

Interiority can include direct thoughts in italics, but it’s more complicated than that

On the surface a scene is a character in a setting experiencing conflict. But scenes also show us:

-      A character’s private expectations (going into the scene)

-      A character’s true options/feelings regarding the scene, people, settings and themselves (including insecurities)

-      A character’s private focus behind their expectations

-      A character privately processing the conflict disturbance

-      A character’s new expectations going forward based on the conflict/disturbance (public and private)

Key Point

Effective Interiority reveals a character’s vulnerability by sharing their private thoughts and feelings in a situation as well as what they expect, hope and fear, and how much they trust what/who is involved.

Frequently Asked Question: Isn’t interiority “telling”

Interiority can be telling … but it can also be showing. A good story will have both showing and telling – whether you’re talking about interiority or any writing tool. Giving an inside look at how your character subjectively processes  information is not optional!

Frequently Asked Question: Does this depend on the genre and/or your writing style?

Yes, but only to an extent. In a mystery novel, a detective might spend one hour processing a clue or a crime scene. In a woman’s fiction story, the character might take a day to process what someone said or did to her. In a fast action thriller, the protagonist might process and react to what happened in a matter of seconds. But regardless of your genre, you can’t leave this out!

Key Point

Writers have to dig a lot deeper to write good, quality scenes with interiority. It tales longer, and it’s more challenging, but …

this is what it takes to write good, quality fiction

Writing interiority stands on the shoulder of both character development and plot.

● Interiority is rooted in a character’s perspective, and no two people are the same

● Interiority exists in relation to something (or someone). Our thoughts are private, but they’re rooted in (or triggered by) something (or someone) else (even ourselves)

Now you know how mastering interiority will help you craft a story with depth that engages your reader from start to finish.