Mood

What is mood?

Feelings. I define them as how you feel after reading a few lines of a story, seeing a photo or listening to a song. It could be the mood of disgust when "Ms. Lina's face contorts after seeing the big fat rat scurrying around her kitchen" or the mood of joy when "Ariff grins from ear to ear as soon as he gets his final examination results that are straight As.". That is what mood is about.

How to put it in your writing?

Step 1 : Select different details to point out each time

Firstly, you pluck out those things to shape your mood. You select specific details support the mood you are after and helps you to  construct different images in your mind. If you are about to write a scene that is supposed to be scary, be mindful of the images and vocabulary you use to describe the setting. You should probably remove the cute and happy family of bunnies, in other words.

Step 2: Use of word pictures and comparisons

You should heavily use work pictures and comparisons in writing. This helps to accentuate the mood in the scene. For example, when describing a yard, you can just use simple similes instead of personification which could be too much at some point.

Step 3: Vocabulary

When writing a scene, choose your vocabulary carefully. Words like grave, bole, shrouded,withered cand creeping to describe a scene very mysteriously while using words like blossomed, furry, bashful and bounded helps you to paint a happy mood. Images of regret and loneliness is helped by the words wasted, brittle and cry to make a scene just pop with that depressing mood.

Step 4: Words that help you paint the picture

When writing a scene, you should subtly use words that "sounded to the eye" . For example, the word shimmered is used when the author wants people to think about shivered, using "cherry" to sound close to cheery and "lacy" to sound like lazy which is relaxed.

Description are like painting. With the right tools, you can convey the right message, image and feeling that the artist wants to create in the painting. It is the words that you choose in your description that helps to convey the mood you want to create for the scene. Use those tools careful and let your imagination run.