Harlan Coben, a New York Times Bestselling author, adds psychological power to his writing by using a variety of rhetorical devices. In his May, 2008 release, HOLD TIGHT, he treats the reader to a SUPER EMPOWERED passage laced with personification. See how he imbues the house with human qualities in this example from page 47.
The house was dead.
That's how Betsy Hill would describe it. Dead. It wasn't merely quiet or still. The house was hollow, gone, deceased--its heart had stopped beating, the blood had stopped flowing, the innards had begun to decay.
Dead. Dead as a doornail, whatever the hell that meant.
Dead as her son, Spencer.
Betsy wanted to move out of this dead house, anywhere really. She did not want to stay in this rotting corpse. Ron, her husband, thought it was too soon. He was probably right. But Betsy hated it here now. She floated through the house as if she, not Spencer, were the ghost.
DEEP EDITING ANALYSIS:
Harlan Coben powered that passage with several rhetorical devices:
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Amplification (e.g., hollow, gone, deceased, rotting corpse)
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Anaphora (Dead. Dead as a doornail . . . Dead as her son, Spencer)
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Personification (house was hollow, gone deceased – its heart stopped beating, blood stopped flowing, innards decaying)
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Simile (as if she – were the ghost).
He also deepened the read with cadence (sentence length, structure, fragments), the power of three (twice in the 5th sentence), scene-themed words (dead, rotting corpse, floated) and backloading (ending three paragraphs with power words—dead, decay, ghost).
Harlan Coben uses rhetorical devices and fresh psychologically anchored writing to tell the reader 15 times that Betsy Miller despised living in the dead house. The dead house that reminded her of her dead son.
Follow Harlan’s lead. When it’s an important message for the reader, get their attention with a Super Empowered passage loaded with rhetorical devices. Deep edit it for psychological power.
