Writing A Book: When To Dump An Internal Question

If your book makes use of internal questions, then you already know one secret to creating a character that’s fleshed-out instead of one-dimensional.

But, like all good things, it can be overdone and there is a point when internal questions are more of an interruption than an interesting writing trick. To avoid such a scenario in your book, try the following:

Writing A Book: When To Dump An Internal Question

Internal questions are great at letting the reader know what a character is thinking, their mood, and how they’ve reached a conclusion or made a specific decision. When it needs to be dumped is usually when…

There’s Too Many In A Row

Jenny stared at the back of Carla’s empty seat. Late as usual. What excuse will she use this time? Did her alarm fail? Did her car not start? Did she have nothing to wear? Clothes too dirty, or not trendy enough. Perhaps she fell down the stairs rushing out the door. Or she lost track of time getting ready. Did her lipstick shade clash with her eyeshadow? Did her mascara run out? Was she at the store spending money she didn’t have just so she could fit in with the people who didn’t notice Carla was even late today?

While Jenny might think these things, and it’s a good way to show she’s concerned about her friend and what she thinks about Carla trying to keep up with other social circles, there are just too many internal questions at once.

Jenny stared at the back of Carla’s empty seat. Late as usual. What excuse will she use this time? Failed alarm? Nothing to wear? A last-minute shopping spree for mascara she couldn’t afford to fit in with the people who didn’t notice Carla was even late today?

By slashing the questions, and sticking to the ones that highlight the info you’re trying to establish about Carla’s character and Jenny’s attitude, you’ve made great use of internal questions, but haven’t overwhelmed your reader, who may not make it through an entire paragraph of questions like in the first example.

Someone once told me a good rule of thumb for when your chapter needs internal questions is to add no more than three to a page. It’s a great guideline to use, and when you combine it with a good edit that only keeps the questions needed to make your point, you’ll know which internal questions to dump.

It’s Doing The Work Of The Reader

Even if your book isn’t the type of story where the reader is required to solve clues or a murder, internal questions are an effective tool for creating mystery.

Readers want something to solve and to reach conclusions on their own. They’ll do that by piecing together the right clues, and if you’ve foreshadowed and asked the right internal question at the right time, your readers will reach the conclusion you want, and they’ll be happy to do it.

If, instead, you have a character internally monologuing the question and then the exact answer right after, you’re robbing the reader of this experience. Allow them to play detective and remove any answered internal questions that do all the work for them.

It’s Repeating The Same Info

If an internal question repeats what’s already shown in the dialogue or the character’s actions, it can safely be dumped.

Remember, if the reader can conclude what’s happening from everything else going on, you don’t need to hit them over the head with repeated internal question after repeated internal question after repeated internal question after repeated internal question (it’s annoying, right? ).

It’s Diluting Impact

A character asking one important internal question at the right time, like when they’ve just discovered a devastating secret, is worth more weight than if the two pages preceding the reveal were littered with related internal questions.

The right-placed question can invest a reader in your characters and plot. The wrong kind, or too many, will exasperate them instead.

Look at the questions leading up to “the moment” and only keep one, ensuring it counts the most so that you’re not diluting its impact.

It’s Padding

When drafting or trying to hit a specific word count, throwing an internal question into your paragraphs keeps things moving and contributes to your number of words.

You may have needed it to clarify where your characters were going or what was happening next. It should have been edited out in draft three. It should have been cut during the final-final-this-time-you-mean-it draft. That was the draft that hit your exact word count, however, so it stayed. The internal question is padding. You know it. The reader will know it too. If it doesn’t move the plot or character forward—press delete.

When you do, you’ll have a story that features intriguing internal questions, not ones that dilute meaning, repeat story elements, steal conclusions from eager readers, and is the tenth one in as many sentences.

Give readers a reason to follow your characters, not roll their eyes every time another internal question pops up, and dump what doesn’t work to ensure you’re using internal questions to their best advantage!

— K.M. Allan

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