I recently saw a post talking about how to get better at writing longer fics and stupid Tumblr (affectionately, but resigned) wouldn't let me post a comment, so I'm writing it here.
If I think a scene is too short in my stories, it's usually because it's dialogue dominant and to fix that yeah, I usually just take a second to feel the emotional weight of the words that are written, so I add context to the character's actions and just take a minute to present their thoughts more clearly. But that works for me because I excel at embellishments, and my creativity lies in emotions and feelings, not facts. (I wrote more advice in my original comment, but I can't remember exactly what, so oh well,).
It boils down to helping contextualise things in the best way, i think, not overly drawn out, but taking time to explain a character's stance on a subject through dialogue, action and thought. In this way you prolong your paragraphs, by taking the time needed to not just translate immediate emotions from your brain to paper, but also to twist your words for the desired effect on your readers.
Always reread, because you will often realise that what you wrote is not enough to present a character and it's surroundings properly. Just because you wrote something once doesn't mean that it can't or shouldn't be rewritten. Sometimes a paragraph needs to be split in two so that you can add to each section individually. Sometimes you realise that something you wrote doesn't make sense, even if you were in the zone when you wrote it. And, seriously, that can make it even more worthy of being edited, for then it's often just a stream of consciousness making it's way known from the depths of your mind. It helps to rewind, to look over what you're trying to say and then embellish (yay! I love doing this!) with other angles or more profound observations.
But what any writer will always tell you is that the single most important way to get better at writing is to continue writing. You often need time to immerse yourself with your character, to familiarise yourself with their mannerisms and thought patterns, to feel what they are feeling in order to not only talk about their actions, but also to be able to describe in an accurate way what they're going through. I always end up writing longer paragraphs the more I write, having connected better emotionally with my characters, knowing more confidentiality how a scene would progress in the most natural way. Thus, the beginnings (that are often purely dialogue and short movements) usually need to be heavily edited by inserting long, winding sentences including explanations as to the surroundings, feelings and thoughts of the characters. But I guess that might just be me.
Love you all and hope this helps,
Julie Ela
