: Re: Describing a person. What needs to be mentioned? When describing the physical features of my more important characters, I often don't add much. I of course describe important features, especially

Describe the important bits
In my opinion Harry Potter is actually an excellent example of how to describe characters. Harry is described in detail because his exact appearance has important bearing on the story. Ron's appearance is slightly less detailed but shows how he is clearly related to the other Weasley's. Hermione is describe as bushy haired with buck-teeth, nothing more is known about her because it isn't important. Rowling has said Hermione could have been black but since it didn't have a bearing on the story it was never included.
Don't add things later on
One thing you need to avoid in describing characters is changing that description later on. Within the first few chapters your readers will have developed an image of that character in their mind. This will be based on the details you gave and biased by their own experiences. If you later add details to the character that conflict with this vision they will reject is and may lose interest in the book entirely. This is known as 'breaking the contract with the reader' and should be avoided.

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: Adapt to the culture. If it's a town of demons and the narrator is implied to be well familiarized with them, then you can go with 'tiphoof' and other such expressions, coining new idioms

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: How can I incorporate poetry techniques to improve my prose? My first question on the site was How do I stop using 'the' to start sentences so much? , One of the answers said:

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: How do I attract readers? When a novel is self-published through something like Amazon, how do I attract readers once it's live? How do I expand beyond just the bubble of people who know me

: Re: Describing a person. What needs to be mentioned? When describing the physical features of my more important characters, I often don't add much. I of course describe important features, especially

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: Adapt to the culture. If it's a town of demons and the narrator is implied to be well familiarized with them, then you can go with 'tiphoof' and other such expressions, coining new idioms

: This tag should be used for questions about fights of any scale - from small-scale fighting scenes in your action packed fantasy novel to large-scale wars between the nations of your modern

: How can I incorporate poetry techniques to improve my prose? My first question on the site was How do I stop using 'the' to start sentences so much? , One of the answers said:

: How do I attract readers? When a novel is self-published through something like Amazon, how do I attract readers once it's live? How do I expand beyond just the bubble of people who know me

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