Book Review: The Emotion Thesaurus

Have you ever been stuck in a scene and your trying to describe a certain emotion, but you’re sick and tired of using the same emotions over and over, or tired of the heated gaze and clinched fists being the sum of your character’s physical show of anger? Well, guess what? Some smart ladies Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi came up with a nifty cheat sheet of 75 different emotions you can dive into and get a whole list of physical cues to break up the monotony of those glares and fists.

On each page of The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Expression there is a definition of the emotion, a whole list of physical cues, some internal sensations, mental responses, cues of acute or long-term effects of the emotion, a may escalate list (of different emotions the original emotion might cause), cues of what may happen when suppressing the emotion for too long, and even a neat little writer’s tip box to enhance the emotion in other ways.

Is that cool, or what?

These ladies also have two other books out (which are on my wish list for future purchase)

The Positive Traits Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Attributes

The Negative Traits Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Flaws

You can also check out their blog Writers Helping Writers where Angela and Becca have more Thesaurus Collections on the site!

The Emotion Thesaurus has become my favorite companion, as it goes with me everywhere I write. I never know when I might want to take a peak inside the pages to help jog my brain for a new way to approach an emotion. I do seem to like to write about anger alot and so I find myself going back to the anger and rage pages. I also like the sadness, anxious, and disgust pages too. 🙂

I just want to say… Thank you Angela and Becca for doing all the work, so I don’t have to stop in the middle of a writing groove and go chasing different ways to have my character in a dark and thunderous rage. Now if I get in a spot, I just take a quick peak at the emotion page I’m trying to write about, and ideas come to me.