: Re: What are the limits to description in story writing? How do I know if I have crossed them? Time and time again, I have been told that my unfounded focus on description distracts from the

@Rambettina586

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I'm late to this, but I'll discuss a few ways your excerpt could be improved, in the opinion of whoever would critique you for purple prose. I suggest you apply similar techniques to another of your paragraphs and see whether these critics deem the result improvements, and whether their reasons why match the ones I'll mention.

Sudden moans accompanied her fidget in the rickshaw. The Spring breeze tickled her ears, and a stray curl now covering her left cheek despite a half-morning's effort. A clip had slid down her corvine hair like a silken waterslide. Almost stealing a glance at her flushed bony limbs, she moved onto focusing on the wide roads of concrete they whirled past.

What have I done here?

Where possible, I have replaced multiple words with one that conveys all the same information: an uneasy shuffle has become a fidget.
The same basic ideas have been expressed in fewer, punchier words. Techniques include omitting words the imagery is likely to stir (such as cold or seat), and where possible letting nouns and verbs do the word of adjectives and adverbs. (Had I kept an uneasy shuffle, that would at least have been better than her shuffling uneasily.)
Show, don't tell: I've not mentioned how she felt, or that her actions revealed such details; the reader does all that work themselves.
Rearrangements have grouped topic progression, and alternated sentence length.

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