Creative Fiction Writing – Punctuation Never To Use – The Exclamation Point

Never Might be too Strong, but Seldom is Quite Correct
I’ve taken a little literary license with the title of this article, since to write that an exclamation point should never be used in a novel is preposterous. But to also state that this medium for emphasis should be used sparingly would not be out of line. Some experts feel that exclamation points are the sign of a lazy writer, or worse–an amateur. Whether the rationale for either opinion is sound or not, there are well-grounded reasons for both.
An Exclamation Point can Support Lazy Telling and not Energetic Showing
To explore the first assumption, this forces the consideration of Showing versus Telling from yet another perspective. The line, John was shocked! eliminates what could amount to many pages (or at least a couple lines) of exposition describing what had contributed to poor John’s frenetic condition. While lessening the rhetorical load, without adequate support for its selection, an exclamation point will often weaken–perhaps even exponentially–the very gravitas the writer is trying to impart. And what about when this sort of punctuation shortcut is taken with dialogue; such as, when John turns to Mary and says, “I am shocked!” True, a lot could’ve happened that the reader is aware of which brought John to this horrific revelation. But it’s when an exclamation point is not supported by antecedent material that serious writing deficiencies present themselves, and many experts agree that this applies equally to both exposition and dialogue.
Now for the Really Grisly Stuff
Nothing is more disappointing than reading otherwise good material when it’s besmirched with punctuation overuse. And seldom is anything more disconcerting than when a writer feels he or she can make every page stand out by overwhelming the reader with exclamation points. If anyone should be writing like this, please ask yourself: If on the first page of my manuscript I have affixed 4 exclamation points and continued my narrative in this vein, and my work is 300 pages in length, is it conceivable that I’ve honestly created 1200 mind-rocking events? And of perhaps even greater significance, after the first 3 pages (and now 12 scintillating scenarios have occurred), can I expect the reader to withstand 1188 additional mind-blowing experiences before finishing my story? and how much impact can I expect exclamation point 1199 to have over what I wrote that elicited, say, exclamation point 662?
There is an Answer, and It’s a Simple One
The example in the last paragraph was extreme, but I recently thumbed through a book that was very close to the exclamation point count I just described. And the author wondered why he’d never been published. There were other issues with this book, but it’s unlikely any reputable agent or bona fide royalty publisher would’ve finished the first page once this rampant misuse of punctuation glared at either of them.
Think One or Two Exclamation Points for an Entire Novel
A suggestion I’ve often heard, and agreed with, is to parse the completed draft of the novel and count the number of exclamation points that were used overall. If more than one exclamation point per 25,000 words, then it’s one too many. This previous sentence is so subjective that it was hard for me to write. But from personal experience, I’ve commonly gone back and analyzed fleshing out a scene rather than leaving an exclamation point to emphasize the story component. And I’ve found that adding to the narrative, and enabling this rhetoric to show the action–thus negating the exclamation point–to be the proper course of action in nine out of ten instances. If you should discover your material invested with abundant “exclaiming,” you might want to consider applying the same remedy.