Personally, I think hippos
are boring when you see them out of the water. Notice how ugly even the baby is
when standing around grazing, or at least that’s my assessment.
In the water, hippos can
be magic. That’s the second photo, which shows only eyes, ears, and noses peeking
out.
We only saw the two
hippos out of the water. I took the photo at about 9:30 a.m. from an open jeep in
Pilanesberg National Park where the wildlife is used to tourists. But in the
late afternoon, when hippos take to the water, we had a number of sightings. Those
were at Songimvelo Game Reserve and along the Zambezi River. And the submerged hippos
were by far the more interesting.
I gather lots of research
when writing fiction. While that’s especially important for historical fiction,
good research is necessary for all genres. Then there are those writers who create
detailed character sketches for their main characters. In the process, we learn
a lot of information that is helpful in developing the story but is of little
interest to our readers. But because we know it, we are tempted to use it.
Bad idea.
Dumping everything we
know into a story is as boring as a hippo out of water. Leaving most of that
information beneath the depths, however, intrigues readers and keeps them
involved.
So leave most of your
research in the hidden depths.
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