by Peter Leavell, @PeterLeavell

Sometimes, I get really sad. People who study this sadness call it depression. I don’t feel depressed, it’s just what doctors call it. 

When I’m feeling down and in the grocery store, I think about the lack of vegetables. Yep. Sadness and vegetables seem to be bedfellows. I think about the variety that used to be—different colored carrots and potatoes, the ugly misshapen foods next to the perfect specimens. They all sold. But today, our choices are limited to only perfect-looking food.

I think the words we use about our emotions are limited, too. They’ve been plucked out of our hands and shuffled into a deck, and the card that’s pulled has been added to a chart an expert can point to and label your sadness in a perfect way. A tidy little category you’re boxed inside.

I’ve felt as if thick mist surrounds hope, so that hope cowers in a corner, afraid to come out and let the sun inside. The word I would choose isn’t depression. Mostly when down, I’m melancholy. Low spirits. A bit blue and forlorn. I like to brood a bit, thinking deeply, just sitting, leaning forward with elbows on knees. The world needs redemption, someone to intervene in the troubles.

When writing a deep character, don’t limit yourself to a list of emotions on a doctor’s chart. You’ve experienced a powerful array of feelings that are difficult to put into words. Yet, if you can, if you are able to show a character’s unique emotional qualities, you’ll bond with reader in new ways. How?

We’re relational. Sarah Ahmed, Suzanne Keen, and others who study emotions in novels tell us that readers connect deeply with fictional characters, and many times, form similar emotions the characters feel. Grabbing onto this correlation is a powerful tool to help your reader learn to cope with his or her own emotions.

We’re not alone. Do you know how comforting it is to read your own pain or buoyancy or frivolity in a text? Emotional connection doesn’t just speak to our soul. It sings. 

When you limit a character’s emotions to a doctor’s chart, you limit your ability to connect with the reader. Expand. Pull out your thesaurus and find the exact word for your emotion, then show in your work what that word looks like in the human condition. Skip the bland, recycled words of a cold laboratory reading designed to sell medication. Rejoice in your humanity and let your emotions sing!

Dino Hunters: Discovery in the Desert

Siblings Josh and Abby Hunter don’t believe their parents’ death was an accident. After taking pictures of the most incredible find of the 1920’s—proof humans and dinosaurs lived together in the same time and place—desperate outlaws armed with tommy guns are on their tail! Only Josh and Abby know where the proof is hidden—in the canyons of Arizona’s desert. When an intruder searches Josh and Abby’s bags inside their new home, the two convince their uncle Dr. David Hunter to return to the canyon and find the pictures they’d hidden. But the outlaws are just as eager to find the proof before Josh and Abby. Can Josh use his super-smart brain to outfox the villains in time? Will Abby’s incredible physical abilities stop full-grown men? And will their uncle believe them?
Dino Hunters is an apologetics-adventure series aimed at the middle reader to help them trust the Bible from the very first verse.