If they scattered me like ashes, all across the land

If they buried me like tooth and nail, and foot, and pallid hand

If they gave me stone to mark my life and my deathly day

And flowers flesh which rotted in a quick and voidless way

I’d be the only life of me, and only death of you

But then I’d have another life, to meet the dark anew

The Storm reaches out across the sky

As the shadows say goodbye to the light

The rain falls down into the sea

As I stand here waiting for you to rescue me

I’ll meet you on the spindly bridge

Where angels die for all our sins

And where the people go

Just to get away

From the lives they live almost every single day

As the storm reaches out, out across the sky

I’ll walk with you where angels fall

And people crawl upon their knees

Where every day

We fade away

From this disease

I’ll hold your hand

Into the land

Of burning trees

As the storm reaches out, out across the sky

I highly recommend Description for anyone wanting to delve deeper into writing description. The most important thing that Wood discussed among these pages is showing vs. telling, putting that debate to rest once and for all. She shows the reader several different ways in which the same passage can be written in full narrative, full dialogue, and a blend of both. There are a number of writers who have a showing or telling style that they employ that is their own, and the trick is to figure out your own balance as it relates to the story you’re trying to tell.

This book is packed with several examples of how to write better description – including how to use more relevant description and to edit out the slower, less relevant writing. I found the contents of Description to be useful in constructing unique people, environments, and actions.

Yuri’s mama always made eggs and shkvarky (chopped and fried pork fat) for breakfast. As he sat on his bed the scent of fried pork wafted into him from the kitchen. They lived very good in Pripyat. Tato worked at the power plant nearby. He promised Yuri they would go and ride on the big ferris wheel in the city’s amusement park. Many people left the city on buses days earlier. Yuri wasn’t even sure how many days had passed. The city stood empty outside his window. Work kept tato a long time. Sometimes mama would turn on some music and dance around the apartment, or tell Yuri stories to help him go to sleep at night. She would sit next to him and stroke his hair with her thin fingers. Mama was so pale.

Adrian wandered through the decaying apartment block. The silence of this place was maddening. Most of the doors to the apartments were left open in haste to leave. Debris lay everywhere. Strips of paint peeled down the walls. The Geiger counter in his hand clicked away melodiously. Adrian donned a white protective suit, but even that was only so protective. He still needed to be careful what he touched. The more the Geiger clicked, the more radiation was present. Adrian felt hopeless when he reached the final apartment on the top floor. The door was shut. He carefully turned the knob and pushed the door open a small crack. A soft noise came from inside, “Tato?”

Dear God, Adrian thought. Speaking through the door, afraid of what he would find, “Bzovsky?”

Through the crack in the door, Adrian could see piles of discarded food tins.

“Yes. Where is my father?”

“Yuri?!”

Adrian was surprised to be talking to Bzovsky’s child. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, but he died in the Chernobyl disaster years ago. How come you didn’t leave when everyone was evacuated on buses, and where is your mother? We just found this discrepancy in our census records.”

Tears welled in Yuri’s eyes, but when he put his hand up to his face, the skin of his cheek stuck to it and sloughed off. The pain wasn’t new. “We were waiting for him.”

Adrian opened the door the rest of the way with his foot. The smell of rotted flesh and excrement filled the space. On the floor of the kitchen was the decaying corpse of Yuri’s mother.

Oh God. Adrian’s heart pounded. She must have left the apartment to do the scavenging, killed by the radiation. Adrian noticed that parts of her were missing. Had Yuri eaten her? He fought the bile back in his throat.

He walked down the short hall into Yuri’s bedroom. Yuri’s face was melting off. Radiation had devoured him for six years. He was only twelve years old now. His right cheek had withered away to the jaw.

“Oh God, we have to leave this place. I can get you help. There’s nothing for you here.” Adrian said. His voice cracked in deep anguish, extremely frightened by the sight of Yuri.

“I want to stay.” A sadness filled his eyes.

“Mama will not be able to find me if you take me away, and tato will never come home.”

Adrian left the apartment, and called his supervisor.

“I checked on things here… and the entire family is dead.”