Passion!

Sex! Greed! Pathos! Pain! Does the word “passion” evoke these for you? They are what literary people think of.

When I think “passion” in the context of non-fiction books, I think of things people really, really care about. Things with which they are deeply involved. Things that they can talk about for hours on end. Things they believe are basically good, even if they are frivolous.

Both are powerful. (Maybe because of mirror neurons.) We echo the feelings represented by the words, and that gets our juices flowing.

I’ve heard it said that the reason bad news dominates newspapers is so that people’s adrenalin will be pumping when they see the ads, so that they’ll have an emotional reaction. And it doesn’t much matter if the reaction is positive or negative; it’s just that strong negative reactions are easier to generate. So that’s why “if it bleeds, it leads.”

When you are writing your book, ignore Sgt. Joe Friday, of the old “Dragnet” tv series, who famously said, “Just the facts, Ma’am.” Your facts need to be dressed in story, something to help your reader identify with what you are saying. Without story and passion, what you write will not hold anyone’s interest.

On the other hand, gratuitous references to body parts or fluids will not accomplish that for most audiences; they will evoke disgust, even revulsion. The passion you convey should relate to the reader’s pain, the thing they want to resolve. Now. If you can, in the well-known advice of copywriters, tap into the conversation that is already taking place in the reader’s head, you have a much better chance of communicating your message to them.

And that’s why you are writing a book, isn’t it? To say something to someone. So use passion, but be civil. You can do it.