Write Things: On Grounding Your Readers

Hello {{ first_name }},

I don’t love just any personal or fictional story.
I love stories that authors loved writing.
Sometimes you can hear the author’s giggles between the words and excitement between moments.
You can tell they deeply enjoyed writing the story.

Here’s what to watch out for when you find yourself writing a story you love.

Mindset Shift

We don’t just love fun or exciting stories. I’ve taken great pleasure in writing about personal angst and struggle in my life.

No, I’m not a sadist. But there’s something deeply satisfying about capturing a feeling or experience just as you imagined it.

And herein lies the problem: sometimes we imagine or know a story so well that we assume our reader does too.

This is especially common in personal writing, but it happens in fiction as well. If we know the settings of our stories intimately, we sometimes forget to describe them. It’s almost like we take those details for granted. The same is true for our characters’ appearances.

Because we know the world and the people inside it, we often jump right into the action—dialogue and movement—without giving readers enough grounding.

What does the room smell like? What’s the antagonist wearing? How old is the furniture? What’s the weather like outside?

For a reader, these details are anchors. They help them visualize and immerse themselves in the story. Without them, readers may comment that they struggled to “get into” your story. Next time you hear that, check whether you’ve given them enough grounding details to enter.

P.S. We’re always learning as writers. Sometimes we’ll have too few, other times too many details. That’s okay! We’re aiming for a mark, so we’ll miss now and then. But don’t feel you need to describe everything. Try sharing just a few details that stand out to you. This not only anchors the story—it also invites the reader to fill in the gaps with their own experiences. That participation makes them part of the story.

If you’d love for writing to be a regular, enriching part of your life—or if you’d like to learn how to access and tell the stories only you can write—I’d love to have you in the online audience tonight for my I’ll Make You a Writer Webinar.

It’s 100% free—my selfish way of making sure there are more original, amazing stories in the world.

I’ll Make You a Writer Webinar
🗓️ Tonight! September 4th, 6:30–8:00pm CDT
Registration includes replay access and a playbook you can use right away.
🔗 Join here

Your Next Four Minutes

Set a timer for four minutes and write whatever comes to mind.
No editing. No expectations. Just listen and write.

Prompt: “A place I pass by”

You might approach it personally—recalling a time you passed something daily but never entered, or reflecting on the feelings it stirred. Or, step into fiction and imagine a character passing something by, and what it reveals about them.

An Easy Technique

👉 Use the shifting light of a candle—flicker, glow, shadow—to mirror a character’s inner state or set the mood.

From the Write Things Community:

Katrina Z.
The candles flickered in the centre of the table as the séance guests all clasped hands at Lady Viola’s command.

She closed her eyes and took deep breaths, ostensibly centring herself to commune with the spirit realm. But in reality, she was centring herself for her performance, going over her lines and cues. She knew the boy she had taken under her wing was under the table, hidden by the long velvet tablecloth. Tommy had been working with her for a few weeks now, an orphan once on the streets now exchanging his help for food and shelter.

Lady Viola had never thought herself motherly, but Tommy was carving a place for himself in her life. And, though she said she only kept him around because of his utility, she knew it was more than that.

At a nudge from the toe of her shoe, Tommy knocked against the underside of the table. The guests, mainly well-to-do men, all gasped and murmured.

Opening her eyes, Lady Viola kept her pupils looking skyward, whites showing, as she convulsed. “Gentlemen,” she garbled. “One of you has to pay.”

Josie M.
I was weeks away from seeing 60 candles on my cake. And was I happy? Well, I certainly wasn’t unhappy. But happy-happy? No. I had fallen into a comfortable life. Doing things I was comfortable doing. Seeing people I was comfortable with.

So why wasn’t I unhappy? Because I had given up. I wasn’t unhappy because I didn’t want to live thinking that something or anything was no longer possible for me, and I had.

Marcie H.
Such simple things. Just wax and string. But what magic they work together. Fueling flames. Their sole purpose to simply feed the fire. It kind of makes me sad to think about the birthday candles in my junk drawer that come out once a year–at best. Lying dormant in the darkness. Candles of all shapes and sizes, sitting on shop shelves, waiting for their chance to shine.

Did you know the pieces shared on the Write Things Podcast all begin as quick-writes like these? They do!
🎙️ Listen to Episode 1 here

If you enjoy this edition, please share it with a friend. The more writers we get writing, the more wonderful stories we’ll have in the world.

Until next time, I wish you and your stories all the best,
Trevor Martens
Founder, I Help You Write Things