Long before those adult coloring books became a fad, I loved to color. Whenever my kids pulled out the crayons, I found myself doodling or filling in a page even after they moved on to the Legos.
There’s something soothing and satisfying in the rainbow look and waxy smell of a newly opened box of pristine crayons. Highlighters get to me, too, with their soft neon colors gliding across a smooth page.
I’m not an artist. I do not paint. I wish I could, so maybe that’s why I welcomed the suggestion to highlight all the senses I could find in my novel. Will the reader taste, touch, see, smell, hear my story? The highlighters are lined up—pink, orange, yellow, green, and blue—each with an assigned sense. I want my pages to pop with the same inviting rainbow as a box of crayons or a package of highlighters.
Color me cautious
Could there be too much of a good thing? I think so. Descriptions draw the reader into the story. But they can stop the action and, well, get kind of boring if they go on too long. I can hear the reader now: “Yes, yes, yes—the trees, the bees, the wind—blah, blah, blah. What’s happening with what’s-her-face and what’s-his-name? Get on with it, already.”
So, a little pink here, a little blue and yellow there, it goes a long way. By appealing to a reader’s senses, hopefully, she’ll get that same pleasure that comes with opening a new box of crayons.
Mary Raebel 