Describing Things: A Guide for Writers and Speakers

By Robert C. Brenner

An essential reference that lists descriptive terms and expressions used by successful authors, writers, and speakers to make their words come alive. These words break writer’s block and free your efforts to create content that produces mental images in the minds of readers and listeners. The most successful writers and speakers are also the most descriptive. Here’s a tool to help you become one of them.

Imagine clicking over to find multiple ways to describe animals such as birds, dogs, fireflies, light, scenes, the sea, smells, sounds and various ways to describe seasons and weather-related subjects such as morning, sunshine, dusk, night, the sun, moon, rain, clouds, wind, and storms. This book includes almost 240 subjects with bookmarks and hyperlinks to enable easy access.

Describing Things can stimulate the creative side of your brain and let you enjoy a unique ability to make your writing interesting and memorable.

(Our content mining efforts continue as we capture more descriptive terms and expressions. Until we release another edition, all confirmed buyers who send us proof of purchase will be sent a complimentary addendum to this book.)

Give yourself permission to be creative. You’ll be glad you did.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Robert C. Brenner
• Release date: Jan 19, 2023
• ISBN: 9780929535319

Robert C. Brenner

Robert Brenner is an engineer, consultant, college professor, historical genealogist, and professional speaker with extensive experience in research and information publishing. A retired naval officer with distinguished service in both nuclear submarines and microelectronic research and development, he holds a bachelor's degree (BSEE) and two master's degrees (MSEE, MSSM). He was recognized a Very High Speed Integrated Circuit (VHSIC) microelectronics pioneer by the DOD and served four years in R&D at TRW after a 23-year Navy career.He is the author of 56 books including Going Solar: a Homeowner’s Experience, Power Up! The Smart Guide to Home Solar Power: How to Make a Wise Solar Investment, How to Construct (and Use) the 45W Harbor Freight Solar Kit, Supernatural & Strange Happenings in the Bible, and Supernatural & Strange Happenings in the Family. In addition, he has written over 275 articles including over 50 articles for Survival Life.com and Survivorpedia.He taught computer technology and engineering subjects at the community college, university, and graduate school levels and has been a guest speaker at over 50 national conferences and symposiums. He is an avid supporter of solar technology and learns by doing. A futurist, he enjoys the challenge of research and is currently sharing his findings through his writing and public presentations. Professor Brenner can be reached at [e-mail].

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RESEARCH NOTES

DESCRIBING THINGS

A Guide for Writers and Speakers

Creative phrases that free writer’s block and make your writing come alive.

Robert C. Brenner, MSEE, MSSM

Published by

Brenner Information Group

Smashwords Edition

ISBN 978-0-929535-31-9

Copyright 2023 Brenner Information Group. All rights reserved. All contents and information herein are the sole property of Brenner Information Group. Reproduction, translation, or republishing of all or any part of this work is not authorized. Brief quotations of the material in this book may be used provided full prominent credit is given as follows: "From Describing Things: A Guide for Writers and Speakers, by Robert C. Brenner. Published by Brenner Information Group." For larger excerpts or reprint rights, contact the publisher.

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Every effort has been made to provide useful information. This book conveys ideas to help you describe people, places, and things. I tried to root out all the descriptions that research time allowed.

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Any use of copyrighted material is done for research, comment, or educational purposes. The publisher does not endorse any product, place, or person inferred by creators of copyrighted material presented herein for criticism, comment, research, or educational purposes under the Fair Use allowance quoted above.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

DESCRIPTIONS

THINGS

Animal

Bird

Fish

Boat

Car

Insect

Bee

Firefly

Flea

Hornet

Tick

Insects (general)

Light

Scene

Season

Ship

Smell

Sound

Submarine

Tree

Truck

Weather

Dark

Dawn

Night

Rain

Sky

Snow

Storm

Sun

Wind

SUMMARY

ABOUT THIS AUTHOR

OTHER BOOKS BY THIS AUTHOR

INTRODUCTION

How to Use This Book

Good writing comes from good rewriting. And the best writing creates a mental image of what the author is trying to describe. It should involve the reader.

To do creative writing, get in the best mental state you can. Visualize what you plan to describe. To break writer’s block, read descriptions in this book. This action will dissolve word freeze and put you in a condition so creative writing flows from your mind like water flows in a stream. Another benefit comes when you read descriptions in this book; you’ll recognize even more that you can describe and you’ll get ideas how best to do this. Through this process your words will come alive in your content and in the minds of your readers.

You can train your mind to become more creative. Try expressive writing by recording your deepest thoughts in short sessions. Try descriptive exercises by mentally creating the best description you can of things you see. Looking at the forest, imagine how you can describe this scene as vividly as you can Through this process you’ll relieve stress and boost your health. And you’ll create some of the finest prose that will surprise even you.

The following were adapted or reworded from descriptive text found during hours of research. These should stimulate your mind to create even better content.

TERMS & EXPRESSIONS

Words, Phrases, and Expressions that Describe Objects or Things

THINGS

(1,906 entries)

[Subjects with multiple entries are listed in bold.]

Accolade

Adage

Advice

Aircraft

Alimony

Animal

Bird

Cat

Deer

Dingo

Dog

Fish

Sting Ray

Turtle

Squirrel

Apple

Attack (See also Battle, Boat, Explosion, Missile Launch, Ship, Submarine, and Tank)

Attire

Bed

Bench

Boat

Book

Bridge

Budget

Cake

Camp

Campfire

Can

Candle

Cap

Car

Carpet Sweeper

Chair

Chance

Cigarette

Clarity

Clock

Clothes

Coffee

Complete

Complicated

Concept

Condition

Control

Cooking

Cross

Cure

Currency

Cushion

Debt

Dock

Dress

Dust

Earthquake

Election

Electricity

Engraving

Equipment

Experience

Explosion

Farm Field

Fence

Fire

Fishing Theory

Flag

Flowers

Food

Foundation

Fountain

Fruit

Furniture

Garden

Ginseng

Gossip

Grass

Grief

Hat

Hatbox

History

Implode

Information

Innocence

Insect

Bee

Butterfly

Cricket

Firefly

Flea

Fly

Hornet

Horsefly

Mosquito

Tick

Insects (general)

Jacket

Jeep

Jet

Kitchen

Knowledge

Land

Lawn

Learn about

Leaves

Legal

Light

Marriage

Meal

Media

Memories

Memory

Mice

Missile Launch

Money

Month July

Month June

Month October

Monsters

Monument

Music

Mutiny

Night Driving

Ocean

Oil

Painting

Phosphorescence

Pity

Plankton

Plants

Police

Politics

Poltergeist

Popular

Prayer

Quiet/Still/Silent

Raincoat

Risk

Sargasso

Scene

School Bus

Season

Serious

Seawater

Security

Shadows

Shake

Ship

Shoes

Smell

Smoke

Snake

Snow Globe

Solitude

Sound

Spoiled

Spread

Stairs

Stars

Stored

Story

Strategy

Submarine

Success

Surprise

Sweat

System

Talisman

Tank

Taste

Tea

Thick

Thought

Tomb

Towel

Tires

Train

Tree

Trip

Trouble

Truck

Uncertainty

Understand

Urban Sprawl

Value

Vehicle

Vines

Wall

Washing Machine

Watch

Water

Waterfall

Weather

Afternoon

Air

Breeze

Cloud

Cold

Dark

Dawn

Daylight

Drought

Dry

Dusk

Dusty

Evening

Fog

Frost

Horizon

Hot

Humid

Hurricane

Late Afternoon

Moon

Moonlight

Morning

Night

Rain

Sky

Snow

Storm

Sun

Sunset

Thunder

Warm

Wind

What If

Willpower

Windmill

Window

Wine

Words

Wrapped Up In

Yard

ACCOLADE: … you’ve got a jewel. Don’t polish me too much. The paste may show through. (Source: THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT by John Steinbeck)

ADAGE: (See also CONDITION)

ADAGE: I wouldn’t give a lead nickel for your chances. (Source: THE RADIO BOYS AT MOUNTAIN PASS by Allen Chapman)

ADAGE: It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good. (Source: THE RADIO BOYS AT MOUNTAIN PASS by Alan Chapman))

ADAGE: If wishes were horses, beggars might ride. (Source: THE RADIO BOYS AT MOUNTAIN PASS by Allen Chapman)

ADAGE: Bright and early; it’s the early bird that gets the rations. (Source: TREASURE ISLAND by Robert Louis Stevenson)

ADAGE: He was as popular as a rattlesnake. (Source: THE RADIO BOYS AT MOUNTAIN PASS by Allen Chapman)

ADVICE: Anyone today who asks for advice just hasn’t been listening. (Source: CHANGING TIMES)

AIRCRAFT: A half-dozen aircraft still on the flight-line would never leave it, their wings snapped like toys from the blast of a missile that had exploded directly over the runway crossroads. (Source: RED STORM RISING by Tom Clancy)

AIRCRAFT: HEAT SIGNATURE: the bombers gave off enough heat to attract the attention of a blind man in a fur coat. (Source: RED STORM RISING by Tom Clancy)

AIRCRAFT: Nearly all tactical aircraft had pleasing lines conferred on them by the need in combat for speed and maneuverability. Not the Hog, which was perhaps the ugliest bird ever built for the U.S. Air Force. Her twin turbofan engines hung like afterthoughts at the twin-rudder tail, itself a throwback to the thirties. Her slab-like wings had not a whit of sweepback and were bent in the middle to accommodate the clumsy landing gear. The undersides of the wings were studded with many hard points so ordnance could be carried, and the fuselage was built around the aircraft’s primary weapon, the GAU-8 thirty-millimeter rotary cannon designed specifically to smash Soviet tanks. (Source: Tom Clancy, THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER)

AIRCRAFT: The fighter moved off the runway like a crippled stork. A minute later she was in the air, a silky smooth feeling of pure power enveloping the pilot at the jet’s nose was pointed at the sky. (Source: RED STORM RISING by Tom Clancy)

AIRCRAFT: The Grumman Greyhound, known to the fleet without affection as a COD (for carrier onboard delivery), a flying delivery truck. (Source: Tom Clancy, THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER)

AIRCRAFT: The jets came over with increasing regularity, swarms of deadly gnats. They go through the sound barrier with a boom that makes me think the furnace has exploded. When they go over at night they get into my dreams and I awaken with a sad sick feeling as though my soul had an ulcer. (Source: THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT by John Steinbeck)

ALIMONY: ... a bounty on the mutiny.

ANCHORAGE: The bottom was clean sand. The plunge of the anchor from our ship sent up clouds of birds wheeling and crying over the woods; but in less than a minute they were down again, and all was once more silent. The place was entirely landlocked, buried in woods, the trees coming right down to high-water mark, the shores mostly flat, and the hilltops standing round at a distant in a sort of amphitheater, one here, one there. Two little rivers, or, rather, two swamps, emptied out into this pond, as you might call it; and the foliage round that part of the shore had a kind of poisonous brightness. (Source: TREASURE ISLAND by Robert Louis Stevenson)

ARMY: LEGION: In the beginning of the AD-CE era, the main unit of the army was called a legion. It consisted of 4,500 men: 3,000 heavy infantry, 1,200 light infantry and 300 horsemen. The real strength of the army lay in its heavy infantry. Each man had a large metal shield, a metal helmet, a leather cuirass which protected the soldier from neck to navel, and weapons. Half carried short Spanish thrusting and cutting swords; the other half carried throwing spears. (Source: THE DAY CHRIST DIED by Jim Bishop)

ANIMAL

BIRD: "I seen the blackbirds on the wires, settin’ so close together. An’ the doves. Nothin’ sets so still as a dove--on the fence wires--maybe two, side by side. (Source: THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck)

BIRD: … a delinquent gang of English sparrows were fighting on the new-coming lawn, not playing but rolling and picking and eye-gouging with such ferocity and so noisily that they didn’t see his approach. (Source: THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT by John Steinbeck)

BIRD: A flight of pelicans flapped solemnly over the water, dark against the bright western sky, keeping their steady line ahead as they passed by. (Source: THE CAPTAIN FROM CONNECTICUT by C.S. Forrester)

BIRD: A small bird came toward the skiff from the north. He was a warbler and flying very low over the water. The old man could see that he was very tired. The bird made the stern of the boat, and rested there. Then he flew around the old man’s head and rested on the line where he was more comfortable. How old are you? the old man asked the bird, Is this your first trip? The bird looked at him when he spole. He was too tired even to examine the line and he teetered on it as his delicate feet gripped it fast. (Source: THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA by Ernest Hemingway)

BIRD: Birds began to pay heaven for their night’s rest (Source: comments by Anthony Thorne)

BIRD: He ran at them, kicking, and the sparrows rose with a whispered roar of wings, complaining bitterly in door-squeak voices. (Source: THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT by John Steinbeck)

BIRD: He was sorry for the birds, especially the small delicate dark terns that were always flying and looking and almost never finding. He wondered why there were delicate and fine birds as sea swallows, when the ocean can be so cruel. (Source: THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA by Ernest Hemingway)

BIRD: In the plaza the pigeons outnumber the red paving slabs. Just to walk from the tall terraced houses around the edges with their stores at ground level I must take small steps to avoid kicking them. These birds have no fear of me, I’m more scared they’ll foul up the Italian leather shoes I bought only last week at Darcy’s. A few minutes later my efforts are rewarded by being able to sit on the edge of the octagonal pool that surrounds the fountain, water spraying many feet into the dry summer air from the lips of a busty mermaid. The droplets arc high before cascading down at the will of gravity. I dig in my satchel for the baguette I plan to eat for lunch and the mass of grey feathers before me gets so dense you can’t see the stone underneath. Between the splashing behind and the squawking in front the sound of the city traffic disappears, and that is why I walk here to eat. Here I can admire the brightly painted old buildings and imagine I am back in my home town. Just for a moment.

BIRD: LOON: The loons clicked incessantly throughout the evening. (Source: THE GUNS OF NAVORONE by Alistair Maclean)

BIRD: the sparrows rose with a whispered roar of wing, complaining bitterly in door-squeak voices. (Source: THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT by John Steinbeck)

BIRD: The whole troop of marsh-birds rose, darkening heaven, with a simultaneous whirr, then descended with a rustle. (Source: TREASURE ISLAND by Robert Louis Stevenson)

BIRD: Two doves sitting side by side on the wooden fence, staring silently into the yard.

BIRD:: A flock of pigeons started from the deck and flew around and settled again and strutted to the edge to look over; white pigeons and blue pigeons and grays, with iridescent wings. (Source: THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck)

BIRD:: All at once there began a sort of bustle among the bulrushes; a wild duck flew up with a quack, another followed, and soon over the whole surface of the marsh, a great cloud of birds hung screaming and circling in the air. I judged at once that some of the shipmates were drawing near along the borders of the fen. (Source: TREASURE ISLAND by Robert Louis Stevenson)

BIRD:: In the plaza the pigeons outnumber the red paving slabs. Just to walk from the tall terraced houses around the edges with their stores at ground level I must take small steps to avoid kicking them. These birds have no fear of me, I'm more scared they'll foul up the Italian leather shoes I bought only last week at Darcy's. A few minutes later my efforts are rewarded by being able to sit on the edge of the octagonal pool that surrounds the fountain, water spraying many feet into the dry summer air from the lips of a busty mermaid. The droplets arc