When you write a story, you want to make it easy for your readers to imagine that they can see your imaginary world. It should be as real to them as it is to you. You will be able to 'paint' a much better picture of the scenes in your story if you give lots of details.
Imagine that your characters are approaching a house. If you don't tell your readers something about the house, they won't be able to see it in their heads or, if they can see it, they might be seeing the wrong kind of house. You must help them to feel that they are actually there.
In one of my stories I have some characters coming across an isolated house on a moor in the Middle Ages. This is how I described it:
The tiny house was made of crudely-cut planks with small glassless windows. Although the roof was thatched with a dark material which looked like reeds, the predominant colour was green due to the large number of grasses and other plants which grew upon it. There was no chimney, but smoke was curling upwards from a hole in the roof. Nestling in a natural hollow on the moor, the house was partially protected from the fierce winds which would blast over the land in winter.
Do you have a picture of it in your head? Now let's go inside.
Although it was midday, the interior of the house was very dark as the tiny windows allowed little light to enter. There was but one room, and most of the space was occupied by a single table, a pair of benches and two straw mattresses. A fire smouldered on a hearth stone and curls of smoke drifted idly upwards towards the hole in the roof. Over the fire, an iron pot was suspended from a tripod and, the visitors assumed, the simmering contents were responsible for the mouth-watering smell which pervaded the house. A black crow sat motionless on a perch and inspected the newcomers with a dark eye.
Could you smell the food? Are you looking round to see who lives in the house?
If you find it difficult to describe things, you could try using your eyes. Look out of the window and really look at the scene outside. When you're watching television, try to describe what you see. Close your eyes and think of real scenes.
Let's imagine that you want to describe a tree. Ask yourself some questions about it.
How tall is it?
Does it have leaves or is it bare?
Is the trunk rough, smooth, gnarled, twisted, straight, slim or
wide?
This is my tree:
Not far from the tiny house an ancient, stunted tree stood gnarled, twisted and leafless on a windswept slope.
Near the house is a magic pool.
Lying in a hollow on the moor, the pool was virtually invisible to anyone who wasn't close enough to throw a stone into its waters. One side of the pool was marked by eight wind-stunted rowan trees which grew at the water's edge, and the opposite side was rimmed with a small field of boulders which were just the right height to provide seats for weary travellers who either knew about the pool or were lucky enough to come across it by chance. A single path led through the boulder field to the pool itself where a perfectly-smooth, flat stone formed a firm bank.
If you like, you can use this as the beginning of a story of your own.
To finish, I'll let you read a piece which I was really pleased with. In case you're wondering, it took me a long time to write this.
Pwyll — the swineherd who had a destiny to fulfil — stood on the highest point of Rhos Goch and surveyed the wild land around him. In the south-west, a huge ruby-red sphere was dropping through gold-streaked furrows of cloud into the secret abyss beyond the Hills of Ludd, the long range of peaks which were named after the sky god. It was only at the beginning and the end of the day that the Sun god permitted mortals to behold his glory: during the hours in between he would punish their impudence by searing their eyeballs with his scorching power.
The magic light of the dying sun painted the whole world in a new set of colours and, for a brief moment, revealed sights which were normally invisible. Pwyll waited. He waited as he did every evening, praying that Ludd would not choose to cloak his domain in a thick veil of cloud.
The silk appeared. In front of Pwyll the heather was suddenly covered with a blanket of shining threads. They looked like the webs of thousands upon thousands of spiders but, when Pwyll studied the ground at other times of day, he had to look long and hard to find a single silken strand. This was just one of the Sun god‘s displays of awe-inspiring magic. A second happened soon after. The heather, flowerless for weeks now, suddenly flared up in crimson splendour and it seemed to Pwyll that the plants were blooming tiny flames; that he was standing in a field of fire.
The final magical manifestation was the most important on this special eve. To Pwyll‘s people, the boar was associated with fire and the life-giving power of the sun. Pwyll always ensured that his swine were standing between him and the sun so that they could receive the god‘s blessing. Although he had witnessed the spectacle on innumerable occasions, it still thrilled him when he saw the edges of their dark silhouettes blazing with a gold-tinged radiance.