More common than air…. Damaging like a giant tornado hitting a chainsaw factory…. Similes are sweeping the nation as fast as a cheetah on a motorcycle.
For the grammatically disinclined (you know who you are, or rather, you SHOULD know who you are), a simile is a comparison between two or more things, often using the words “like,” “than” or the ever popular “as [blank] as a [blank].”
Now, as with any other writing device, similes can be done well. Some writers use them to tremendous effect, some wonderful writers even use them often, and I would not take their similes away from them. This doesn’t apply to everyone.
But as Johns Hopkins MFA grad and author May Vanderbilt told me this weekend as we were discussing writing over drinks at the San Francisco Writer’s Conference after our panel with editor Christine Pride (yes, this is what agents and writers do at writer’s conferences), she was once told in writing school that you get one or two similes a book. No more.
No doubt this is hyperbolic advice and not meant to be taken literally. You don’t got ONLY two similes. But unless your gift for similes is as grand as a Steinway piano (get it??), this is something to keep in mind. Similes are like jalapeno peppers. They can add some spice, but too many of them and your reader will spit out your novel and run away.
Anonymous says
One or two? ONE or TWO?
Whaddaya mean, one or two?
AKKKK!
Taylor K. says
Reminds me of a joke a comedian named Demetri Martin once told:
“I have a friend who’s really into similes. He’s like…annoying.”
Similes can be particularly annoying, IMO, especially when they try to be overly grandiose (such as my just now use of the word grandiose).
May Vanderbilt says
Similes make me sadder than a baby with a full diaper, more frustrated than Nathan reading a query letter that opens with a rhetorical question, and angrier than Hillary when Texas votes for Obama.
My profs at Hopkins were Alice McDermott and Stephen Dixon. Another thing they told us is two adverbs a book.
Try it some time. It will make your head explode.
Katie says
First, “Hi,” and it’s good to be back! I had to spent two tortuous months offline for an extended move, and I’ve missed your blog!
On to the subject… I see two main types of similes, and I’m wondering if you see or care about this distinction.
The basic type (of which there are far too many) is when they’re simply used to describe something… and you end up wondering if the author resorted to the simile because they couldn’t describe whatever-it-was well enough.
The other type, which I find very effective when I’m reading, is when the simile tells more about the fantasy world or the person’s character than lots of description possibly could. For example, the author is in deep POV, and the person is thinking about how something is more beautiful than XYZ… and you gather from that choice of XYZ, not only that XYZ exist in this fantasy world, but that they are considered extremely beautiful by that person, who doesn’t get to see them so often because they are so far away, but they journey there once a year just for the privilege.
I’m afraid that that (I hate typing double “that’s.”) was a really bad example, but what do you think about this type simile? Do they still irk you, or do you also find them effective?
Lauren says
When I was a wee 12-year-old novelist, I would give my novel drafts to my two best friends to read. Generally, I got glowing reviews (especially when I inserted one of my pals into the story, or had one of the popular girls from our grade be struck down by an ultimately disfiguring illness or injury). But one time, I decided my writing wasn’t writerly enough, so I rewrote my first few chapters and inserted similes and metaphors on nearly every page. Suddenly, my 12-year-old characters were “running like wild horses” down the streets of Manhattan.
My friends’ reviews for that draft were about as scathing as Michiko Kakutani’s review of that Jonathan Franzen memoir.
That being said, I recently finished reading Lorrie Moore’s short story collection BIRDS OF AMERICA and her use of similes astounded me. Recommended reading for anyone who wants to see a really masterful use of figurative language.
Nathan Bransford says
katie-
I don’t know if it would be fully possible to break down similes into categories. It’s one of those things where they either work or they don’t. They’re extremely hard to do well, and to my eye the good ones seem to be both apt, unique, and consistent with the world of the book. But it’s so hard to pin down what makes good ones work. Maybe other people have some ideas about what separates the good similes from the bad?
C.J. says
kim – i agree with you on the adverb front. somewhere way back a prof told me to avoid them altogether. what he didn’t explain, but i figured out later, is that often the adverb serves to tell instead of show. saying ‘he walked furtively’ is difficult to picture, and you can’t trust the reader to stop reading, think ‘hmmm, what does a furtive walk look like?’ then start reading again after he/she has the image in mind. the same kind of idea applies to similes. too often you’re pulling the reader out of the scene. if your crime drama has a henchman with a long neck, saying he has a neck like a giraffe pulls the reader out of the gritty alley and puts them into the savanna for a moment. i think it’s considering the full ramifications of your phrase that separates an effective simile from a cumbersome one
Brian says
I went to school with someone who used two similes per PARAGRAPH. Minimum. I’m not kidding. She believed that if a paragraph looked skinny, it could be fattened up with a couple nicely phrased similes. The workshop always smiled nicely at her and tried to talk her out of them. To her, similes made writing come to life. If you could get past the similes, she wrote very well. But, man, if her prose got any more purple the Oompa Loompas would need to cart it off to the Juicing Room.
Now, if you want to talk emerging cliches, I think “washing over me” should be on the new Forbidden Phrases 2008. Ick. Or maybe it already is and I missed the memo? Can the memo go out again? Preferably in red, block letters.
Cicily Janus says
Quick as lightening, the editor crumpled up the submission due to its overuse of similes and pitched it as fast as Cy Young into the trash can next to her.
Great advice, Nathan.
And as for the comment left by May Vanderbilt, yes, cut the adverbs out! Two a book? Sure! I’ll go for that.
Sophia says
I read that title as “Your SMILES are like a giant flood washing over me”, and thought, “That’s so nice! A feel-good wave spreading across the country”. 🙂
Eric says
One observation I’ve had is that in real life people very seldom use similes. When they do, it is far more likely to be done to mock and/or cast dispersions, not to breathe poetry into whatever they’re offering up. And, more often than not, it’s cliché rather than something truly original.
“He’s like a broken record…always repeating himself.”
Hardly ever do you hear, “The waves seemed to have a greater purpose that day, keeping us from straying out too deep like a gentle mother’s voice calling us back to the shore.”
“Yeah, glad you enjoyed your vacation. Listen, I gotta be like a tree and leave.”
Janet says
Thank you! This is your public service post for the year.
Anonymous says
I just looked up Lorrie Moore’s short story collection BIRDS OF AMERICA.
I wish they had an excerpt.
One of the reviews I read did. It was short but gave me a look. (The description of love like raccoons in the chimney.)
I was knocked out!
(Hint: the excerpts on Amazon, etc. help sell the book – I almost never buy without one.)
Just_Me says
May~
Two adverbs per book??? Can I sign up for special dispensation of some kind? Papal allowance to use “ly” perhaps?
Simile I think I can live without, but adverbs will live at least through a rough draft, maybe not to the final draft but if I set a goal of not using adverbs on a first draft, yes, my cranium would go kaboom!
Adaora A. says
I think it’s really hard to make it not be remotely cheesy. That’s the rub. How do you do it without people cringing when they read.
Have you been getting them in query letters lately Nathan?
Anonymous says
Nathan, (or anyone)
Would love to read more examples of “well done” similes.
Anonymous says
I think the best similes are the effortless ones, the ones that don’t make you think “hey, lookit this fancy-pants writer!” I think that’s quite difficult. But they are fun to write. (“Silvered hair swept straight back across his scalp like scratches on a chrome bumper.” Survived until the third draft, alas.)
As for adverbs, I strike them down like Zeus hurling thunderbolts.
moonrat says
thanks for this. my opinion has crystalized like ice on a pond. (that would be a phrase i struck this morning.)
Katie Alender says
What separates good from bad, for me, is that a good one clarifies and a bad one makes things worse.
Nothing is worse than reading a bad simile and having to stop, get out of the story, and think about what exactly the writer is trying to get you to think.
Margaret Atwood uses figurative language wonderfully. So does Elizabeth Gilbert in “Eat, Pray, Love”.
The most laughable (in a bad way) use of similes I’ve seen lately is the book “You: On a Diet”.
Other Lisa says
HAH! This is one of my pet peeves. Just because a writer throws in a bunch of similes doesn’t make it “literary.” I’m thinking of a particularly well-regarded book by a young author that had a couple of these things per page – drove me crazy.
Anonymous says
No similies or adverbs in narrative. Especially no laughingly, exceedingly, or frustratingly…at least not unless it’s necessary, like when a character in the book is known for his/her adverbs or similies, and it’s used in dialogue.
Bob said, “Laughingly, like the clown at the annual church Easter picnic, this exceedingly wide young woman, in a green and white striped tent dress, sat on a basket of colored easter eggs so gently you would have thought she’d laid the little devils herself.”
You can’t punish or embarrass your characters, and you can’t teach them how to speak, ah, correctly.
Anonymous says
Sometimes all these writing rules make me want to pull my hair out.
I always learn from them.
But there are dangers.
An example I will give is an artist I know.
He is accomplished.
But he has a set of rules for design stuck in his head and now all his work looks formulistic. He is a good designer, but not much of an original, unique artist.
I have written things that people will not give back or request personal copies of, including college papers, e-mails, stories.
I know I have broken most if not all of the rules. Hell, I don’t know the
rules. I learn as I go.
And I get ALL my sayings backwards. Me and Yogi Bera.
But those people I affected, were affected! That’s what I noticed.
So, since I probably screwed up the rules, should I politely take back and burn everything?
I appreciate learning more, here. Really, this IS helpful. I am developing a further appreciation for being well read and being totally confused about writing.
Kerouac said:
“5. Something that you feel will find its own form”
Thank God, I have some direction into the unknown too.
–
Anonymous says
Don’t get hung up on the rules, since they’re mostly just suggestion anyway. Except for Elmore Leonard’s. Those are funny.
Laurel Amberdine says
Huh.
Fine by me; I can’t ever think of good similies, and in SF/F they’re hardly usable anyway.
Occasionally, though, they can be useful for worldbuilding in a backwards kind of [familiar thing] is like [alien thing] way.
But too much of that gets meaningless fast.
Steph Leite says
Interestingly enough, in middle school they teach you to use as many description devices (metaphors, similes, adverbs, adjectives) as possible.
And they also said never to use the word “said”, so I take all the advice there acquired with a grain of salt.
Nathan, what about said-bookisms? Any personal agent thoughts on those? I read somewhere that editors loathe them. I would’ve never guessed, considering half of a YA book nowadays is replacing the word “said” with something like “interjected”, “shrieked”, “protested”, “cajoled”, etc.
I found that “said” works as well as anything else. Your dialogue has to be powerful to get the manner of speech across with just a “said”, and that’s always a plus.
– Steph
Redzilla says
Sometimes, Nathan, your blog is a like a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, but mostly it is helpful.
lauramanivong says
Three hours of my life gone–gone I tell you, haggling over a stupid simile. My critique partners should have shut me down like a toilet seat in a locker room, but noooo, they kept telling me the wording wasn’t quite right. So I kept tweaking.
My paragraph wasn’t cured until I hit delete.
Anonymous says
Hi Nathan (and Nathan’s blog community)!
I’ve been lurking here for a while now and very much enjoy reading your posts and comments.
I was moved to comment because I wanted some clarification. We all know the difference between similes and metaphors (or at least we should); however, both are figurative language. Whether it is said overtly or not, they both provide an image that (ideally) further explains how someone is feeling, how something looks, etc.
In the novel I’m currently working on (my first), I have the following metaphor:
“On the night of Henry’s death, I forced myself to be there in the nursery. Of course, I was there in body, but my mind flapped against the edges of the room, beating itself bloody on the wallpaper.”
This is a metaphor, of course. The implied comparison is that her mind is like a trapped bird. So here is my question: Do you believe that use of metaphors such as the above should be restricted in the same way you suggest for similes? What do the other writers here think as well?
Thanks!
–Kate
R.J. Anderson says
Thank heavens Peter S. Beagle didn’t listen to that advice, or The Last Unicorn would have been a very short and much less entertaining book.
Josephine Damian says
Adverbs are the kiss of death for me – a big no-no.
Anonymous says
I just looked over some things of mine that have been described as “the best thing you’ve ever written.” Two per page. That’s me. In all the years I’ve been writing, no one has ever informed me before that you’re not supposed to use similes. In the hundred words I submitted to the Bookends contest, I used three (three!) in one paragraph. I don’t know if I can break myself of the habit, and I may need to give up writing now. I have to say, though, things I’ve written that contain several similes usually get more attention and praise than those which contain none. ???
no-bull-steve says
This article was as helpful as a college course and as useful as a um, an advanced college course.
My newest pet peeve is “as if.” It’s become as if people use it every page. It’s as if they need to avoid the POV violation and tell rather than show. It’s as if we don’t get tired of….ARRRRGH.
Betsy Dornbusch says
Thank you, thank you.
Anonymous says
Anon @ 12:58…Similies can look good in short bites if they’re clever. A contest opening with a great simile earns great praise; a manuscript crammed full of them may leave the reader wondering when you’re gonna stop being cute and just tell the story already.
Anonymous says
Anonymous/Kate: On your “flapping mind.” Mind & brain are different, but your metaphor makes the mind physical, which makes me think gray matter. Particularly when you talk about it getting bloody against the walls.
Charlotte says
Hmmm, interesting tip. And metaphors? Any limit on those?
sylvia says
Clearly that was a typo. Nathan meant one or two per paragraph.
Kylie says
I like metaphors a lot more than similes (I think I have barely used to or three similes in my writing career so far, while I do love to read and write metaphors).
So I would second Kate’s question and also like to add, how about the big “extended metaphors”? Are these better or worse than similes?
Jennifer Walker says
Simile is like your friend, but not your best friend. You can invite him over from time to time, but don’t live with him for Pete’s sake.
Furious D says
That post about similes was like… …ummm… like…. great, now I’m similed out.
Anonymous @ 1:58 says
Anonymous @ 1:26: Guess we’ll see. If I don’t make the cut, at least I’ll have some idea as to why not.
Anonymous @ 12:58 says
12:58! Gah! 12:58! Damn cat!
Anonymous says
i think this may be the first time i’ve witnessed you actually giving aspiring writers BAD advice. the entire point of a simile is to trigger stronger seeing-in-the-mind for the reader. claiming that a good novel should have “one or two” similes is a lot like saying only select writers are allowed to join the exclusive “simile-club.” everyone else should just give it up. utterly moronic.
Nathan Bransford says
anon-
As I mentioned repeatedly in my post, similes can work. But too often aspiring writers think similes are “writerly” and they pepper their novel with them when simple description would be much more effective. Others are better at it and make the similes work in their favor. But everyone should take a close look to see if they’re necessary/effective.
Honestly, there IS a simile club, and very few are allowed in. Everyone else only gets a taste.
And you don’t have to take my word for it — May went to a writing school taught by Alice McDermott and Stephen Dixon, and that’s where I heard this advice.
Dave Wood says
It seems that some writing is just out to tell a really good story: the “Just the facts, Ma’am,” school. That’s great as far as it goes, and I love a lot of those books. Other writing strives to dig deeper or do something more. Those books represent a bigger risk (and a smaller market, probably) for the author, but often provide a greater reward for the intended reader. I’m glad our language provides so many tools (judiciously used) for that kind of effort.
C.J. says
kate – for me, the same advice goes for metaphors as for similes: you have to consider both the meaning of the metaphor/simile (does his neck look like a giraffe’s?) and the flavor of the metaphor/simile (do i want my reader to picture the african landscape while i’m describing this character?). so, in your case, the metaphor seems appropriate if want the tone be very macabre and blunt.
Nicole Del Sesto says
I think Tom Robbins is a master of the simile craft!
I love a simile that makes me laugh out loud.
Unrelated, Nathan, I’m sure you seen this but a well-done rebuttal to the Steve Jobs reading bomb can be found here:
https://egan.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/20/book-lust/index.html
Nicole Del Sesto says
Hmmm … I don’t think I got that whole link, let me try this:
We do too read
Anonymous says
The dear departed Ogden Nash wrote a poem on similes and metaphors — “Very Like a Whale.” Check it out.
I’m with him.
Terri B. says
I like YOUR simile! Jalapeno peppers. Something to think about.