Using Metaphors and Similes

It's almost impossible to escape similes and metaphors since they surround us. Not just in literature, but in advertisements and music as well. Pat Benatar knew all about it when she said "Love is a battlefield." 

Sure you probably haven't thought about the exact use of similes and metaphors since that grammar test you took long ago in high school or even further back in middle school, but similes and metaphors are powerful literary devices that will help you convey thoughts and emotions to your reader in an impactful way. 

Writing is a puzzle, and each word is a piece that fits snugly into place, creating a picture that delights the mind. ← Metaphor 

Before you learn how to use these literary devices let's once again bring you back to a time of wooden desks, chalkboards, or dry-erase boards if you were lucky enough to escape the never-ending cloud of dust, and let's take a quick refresher course.  

Understanding Metaphors and Similes

Your reader isn't going to shift through your book and pick out the similes and metaphors unless you are lucky enough to get the Shakespeare treatment and have your work dissected and examined by students who are thinking more about lunch than how well the author compared the black curtains to the burnt embers of hell. So knowing the difference isn't all too important, but it'll help you out when it's time to use them to know what they are and what they do.

Defining Metaphors and Similes

A metaphor takes two things that are unrelated to each other and states that one thing is another 

A simile takes two things and tries to show you how they are connected using "like" or "as" to point it out to you. 

Impact of Metaphors and Similes in Storytelling

• Enhance Imagery

Sure you could just say that "the moon was bright", but wouldn't it sound better if that moon was like something else, such as "like a radiant lantern, casting its soft light upon the village below?" 

• Evoke Emotions

Metaphors and similes give you the opportunity to bring out the reader's emotions by expanding on those of your character. For example, if your character is angry at a betrayal, give it some description such as, "a beast raged within her, tearing and scratching at the walls of her heart demanding to be set loose."  

• Deepen Meaning

If you've been anywhere around anything you'll know the phrase to rise like a phoenix from the ashes. Doesn't this give it a bit more meaning than simply saying they got back up when they were knocked down? Sounds more like the resistance to adversity than a tiff in the schoolyard.

Techniques for Using Metaphors and Similes in Your Novel

Now that you know what we're working with, let's find out how to work with it. 

Sensory Details 

You want to put your reader into your story in any way that you can, you don't want them to just know that the smell of freshly baked bread is in the air, you want the smell to envelop them like a warm embrace.

You want to hear her laughter dancing in the room, filling it with the sounds of ringing bells. 

You want her touch to be as gentle as a feather, tracing delicate patterns on your skin. 

Give your reader a vivid sensory experience. Don't just let them read it, let them feel, see, taste, and smell it. 

Show, Don't Tell 

Put down that book, it'll do more damage to your screen than it'll do to me. 

I know you're sick of this one, but I'm going to continue to repeat it until I can't type anymore and then I'll probably learn to type with chopsticks in my teeth just so you don't forget it. 

Never tell your reader what you should be showing them, especially with emotions. She was angry. She was scared. She was heartbroken. 

Make her angry like a storm brewing on the horizon.

Show her in love, as gently as a whisper in the wind.

Break her heart, her emotions shattered like fragile glass and he was the careless hand. 

Give your readers something to see in your character's emotions, sure it's all just words, but so is poetry and it can bring some of the biggest grown men to tears. 

Balance Creativity and Clarity 

It's the age-old adage that you can in fact have too much of a good thing. 

"The sun rose in the sky, a radiant golden orb that cast its warm embrace over the world. Its rays were like delicate fingers, reaching out to caress the earth and awaken its slumbering inhabitants. The flowers, like colorful jewels, nodded their heads in gratitude, basking in the sun's loving gaze. The breeze, a gentle whispering lover, danced through the trees, playing a melodic symphony with their swaying branches. The river flowed like a silver ribbon, its currents shimmering and sparkling in the sunlight."

At some point, your reader is going to start wondering when the story is going to start especially if this continued any longer. Sure if I was writing poetry this would fit right in, or if this was fiction written years ago sure, but today's readers don't want waxing poetics in their fiction, they want you to get to the good stuff. 

You want to enhance your narrative, not bury it under pretty words.

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Writing metaphors and similes come naturally to some writers and for others, it'll take a bit of practice to remember to include them every once in a while or to not overdo it, but this is what editing is for. 

Now get to writing.

With love, 

BK. xo xo

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