How to Show, Not Tell in Fiction with AI Help

1. What does show, not tell mean in fiction?

Telling gives readers a conclusion. Showing offers evidence that lets them reach that conclusion themselves. Neither is automatically better: the right choice depends on how much attention a moment deserves.

Compare these two versions:

Telling: “Nora resented her brother for leaving her to care for their father.”

Showing: “Her brother reached for the visitor’s chair. Nora left the medication chart on its seat. ‘You can start with the evening doses.’”

The second version makes resentment visible through a choice, an object and a line of dialogue. It also gives readers room to interpret the relationship. Nora does not need to announce her feelings for us to sense them.

Showing usually draws on action, dialogue, sensory details and a viewpoint character’s thoughts. It does not mean writing everything as if a camera were recording it. An interior observation can reveal just as much as a physical gesture.

For example, “He had remembered her birthday. Someone must have reminded him” shows distrust through interpretation rather than body language. The useful question is not “Have I removed every emotion word?” but “Can the reader experience what matters here?”

2. Choose the moments worth showing

Trying to show everything can make a novel exhausting. Readers do not need a fully dramatised account of every commute, meal or change of clothes. Summary keeps the story moving between important moments.

Spend more space when a character makes a consequential choice, discovers something unsettling or changes their understanding of another person. Use telling when readers need context without a scene attached.

A paragraph can combine both approaches. “For three weeks, Dad had mistaken her for her mother” gives efficient context. Follow it with a specific moment when he recognises her, and that moment gains weight from the summary.

Before expanding a sentence, ask what readers would lose if it remained brief. If the answer is “nothing important”, telling may already be doing its job.

This also protects motivation. You do not have to turn every plain sentence into an elaborate passage before your draft is allowed to progress.

3. Replace labels with character-specific evidence

Generic gestures often produce generic characters. Clenched fists can suggest anger, but they tell us little about the person feeling it. A more useful detail connects the emotion to the character’s habits, circumstances or immediate goal.

Imagine a freelance illustrator opening a client email after several unpaid revisions.

First version: “Leah was angry that the client wanted more changes.”

Overwritten version: “Leah’s blood boiled, her fists clenched and fury surged through every fibre of her being.”

More specific version: “Leah opened the reply box and typed ‘Of course’. She deleted it, pulled up the original brief and highlighted the words ‘two revision rounds’.”

The final version gives anger a direction. It also suggests that Leah is trying to change how she handles the relationship. The action matters because it affects what happens next.

Use the detail your viewpoint character would notice

An anxious guest might notice the distance to the door. A caterer might notice that nobody has touched the food. The room is the same, but their attention makes it feel different.

Choose sensory details for relevance, not coverage. You do not need sight, sound, smell, taste and touch in every scene. One unexpected silence may do more work than a paragraph describing the furniture.

For setting-focused examples, the guide to building a fictional world with AI help explores how to connect a place to the story rather than adding background for its own sake.

Let dialogue carry an unstated meaning

Characters do not always say what they feel, especially when admitting it would cost them something.

“You never visit” states a complaint directly. “Should I show you where we keep the mugs now?” can express the same complaint while revealing defensiveness or hurt. The surrounding scene determines whether that line lands as teasing, bitterness or both.

Do not force every exchange into subtext, though. Direct speech can be powerful when a character finally stops avoiding the truth.

Related guideHow to Write a Short Story with AI Help: From Idea to Finished Draft

4. Use AI as a diagnostic reader, not a replacement voice

AI can help identify passages that explain an emotion without giving readers much evidence. It can also overcorrect, adding melodrama, clichés or details that contradict your story. Start by asking for an assessment rather than an immediate rewrite.

Use a short extract that you own and are comfortable sharing. Check the AI service’s data settings before uploading unpublished work, and avoid including confidential material from clients or your day job.

Try this prompt in your chosen AI assistant:

Read this scene as an editor. Identify up to three places where I explain an important emotion or relationship instead of making it perceptible. Quote the relevant wording. Explain whether showing would genuinely improve the moment, or whether summary is more efficient. Do not rewrite the scene or invent background facts. Viewpoint: close third person. Intended style: restrained and conversational. Scene: [paste extract].

Then work through this short revision checklist:

1. Confirm the diagnosis. Is this a significant moment, or useful summary?
2. Name the hidden pressure. What does the character want, fear or refuse to admit?
3. Choose one signal. Use an action, thought, object or line of dialogue.
4. Write your own alternative. Keep the surrounding viewpoint and tone intact.
5. Read both versions aloud. Keep the version that is clearer and more convincing.

For Leah’s scene, you might ask AI for three plausible actions that suggest frustration without naming it. Add constraints: she needs the client’s income, avoids confrontation and is working alone. Those constraints help keep suggestions tied to character rather than stock gestures.

Reject any option that invents an established history or changes her personality merely to make the paragraph dramatic. For deeper motivation work, see how to write a villain with AI help; its questions about motives and limits can also inform other characters.

Finally, check for double explanation. If Leah highlights the revision limit and the next sentence says “She was angry about the extra work”, the second sentence may be unnecessary. But keep direct explanation when it adds a complication the action cannot convey.

5. Where Pitanga Labs fits

Pitanga Book Studio supports the planning and writing around this kind of revision: AI book outlines, character and plot planning, a distraction-free editor and writing goals. An outline costs 8 credits; writing and exporting are free. It uses your Pitanga Labs account and credits.

The benefit here is keeping the bigger story in view. Before polishing Leah’s gestures, decide whether this scene is a minor frustration or the first time she sets a boundary. Character and plot planning help you make that decision before spending time on sentence-level detail.

Use a small writing goal to keep the task manageable: revise one important exchange rather than removing every instance of telling from the manuscript. The diagnostic prompts above are general AI workflows, not a claim that Book Studio includes a dedicated show-don’t-tell checker.

When you want to review the draft away from the editor, Book Studio offers PDF, EPUB and Markdown export. You can use those files for a separate reading pass; export alone does not replace proofreading or checking a self-publishing platform’s requirements.

Conclusion

Showing works best when readers need to experience a choice, emotion or shift in a relationship. Telling works best when they need clear context and forward movement. Aim for a deliberate balance, not a manuscript with every emotion word removed. Today, choose one important paragraph, identify the pressure underneath it and replace a general label with one character-specific detail. Use AI to question your choices, then make the final decision yourself. Open Pitanga Book Studio and give that single-scene revision a manageable place in your writing plan.

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