Stop Telling Me He's Angry – Show Me: A Writer's Guide to Show, Don't Tell

One writing note I give out more than any other is: ‘Show, don’t tell.’

It doesn’t matter whether you’re writing middle-grade adventure, cosy romance, or some steampunk-leaning thriller with anthropomorphic sky pirates and science held together with duct tape and hope – at some point, I’ll leave the same note in the margins.

And it might sound pretty easy – until you start to edit. Don’t worry, I’ve done it myself, both my editor and I catch times I slip into telling – every writer does it. And it’s not always bad.

So let’s start at the beginning… What’s the difference?

Show, don't tell means revealing emotions through actions, dialogue, body language, and reactions rather than directly naming the emotion. Instead of saying "he was angry", show the reader what anger looks like on the page.

Telling summarises the emotion for the reader.
Showing lets the reader infer it from behaviour.

Same information. Completely different experience.

Telling Looks Like:

He felt embarrassed.
She was heartbroken and angry.
She felt proud of her achievements.

All perfectly valid sentences. They do their job. They just don’t invite the reader into the scene. They tell us what’s happening emotionally, but they don’t let us feel it.

It’s a bit like having read 99% of an epic romantic tale then on your train home someone sits down next to you, glances at your page and says, “This ending is so sad. When Melissa goes into—”
And suddenly the moment is gone.

Showing Looks Like:

He pushed his glasses up his nose, cheeks pinking as he rubbed the back of his neck, eyes fixed on anything but her.

She strode across the room, slammed the photo down on the table and glared at him, eyes lit from within like fire.

She kept re-reading her report card, biting her lip to stop herself smiling too widely.

Now we’re inside the moment.

We’re not being spoonfed the emotion – we’re watching it take shape in real time. Which is where all the interesting stuff lives.

So… should we just ban telling?

No. Absolutely not. Step away from that delete key.

Telling is useful. Some parts of a story would drag on for days without it. Because let’s face it, who wants the details of your protagonist walking from the car park to the bar with every step, sniff, and scratch of his unmentionables included?

But the issue isn’t telling itself.

It’s when telling sneaks into the moments that are supposed to land emotionally.

Romance Wants to Show You Something

Now, I’m a romance author, so this is where I honed my craft, and as a genre, romance is a prime example of the need for showing over telling.

It’s not just what happens on the page…

… it’s what happens beneath the words.

You can tell me your MMC is in love, that your FMC is jealous, that they’re both emotionally spiralling because, well… because it’s a romance novel and where would it be without a little miscommunication?

And I’ll believe you. I just won’t feel it.

Readers don’t want to be told. They want to feel.

A message left on read a little too long.
A moment spent suddenly fascinated by the floor, as if it’s offering up important information.
A hand that almost reaches, then thinks better of it.
A glance held just long enough to say something neither person names.
Both reaching for the popcorn at the exact same moment, then pretending it didn’t happen.

Those are the moments we see the emotions.

The Emotion Experiment

If your writing is heavy on emotion labels, try this little trick: Remove that label.

Then ask yourself: does anything meaningful and emotional remain?

If the sentence still communicates the feeling through action or behaviour, you’re showing. It’s then likely that you don’t need the emotion named at all.

If it stops meaning anything, you’re telling.

Example: Remove the emotion and see what you’re left with

He was angry at her.

Removing ‘angry’ here leaves nothing useful at all.

He was angry at her as he slammed the door and threw his keys onto the counter.

Remove ‘angry’ here, and you’re still left with an observable action that conveys his emotion. The naming of the emotion then becomes unnecessary.

Final version: He slammed the door and threw his keys onto the counter.

You might even choose to really push the imagery.

E.g. He slammed the door hard enough for the frame to shake, threw his keys onto the counter, and didn’t say a word.

The takeaway

‘Show, don’t tell’ isn’t a rule to follow every single time. It’s more like a persistent red pen that asks you to really look at what your scene needs.

It’s simply about making sure the moments that matter actually land with the reader so they can experience them for themselves. Rather than handing them the details, trust your writing to convey what you want it to. And trust your reader to pick up on it.

If you want a quick way to turn ‘he was angry’ into something that actually lands on the page, I’ve put together a free Show, Don’t Tell Cheat Sheet you can keep beside your manuscript.