Beyond the Easy Gesture in Fiction

 

Oh, those flashing eyes!

The other day, I laughed when I read the recent tweet of a fellow writer: “There’s a lot of ‘flashing eyes’ in this draft. Need to fix.”

Our fictional characters certainly do flash their eyes. They also roll them, grind their jaws, blink, sneer, grimace, and smile in varying degrees from crookedly to unabashed. They shrug, cross their arms, tremble, and shake their heads like imaginary marionettes.

What are your go-to gestures or expressions when you write? I tend...