See Me, Feel Me from James W. Ziskin

How do you work sensory details into your writing?

I love to use all the senses in my writing, perhaps because I love description. Here are some examples.

Sight (and sound)

I found him almost handsome. But his brow jutted a fraction of an inch too far over his hungry eyes, and his chin looked to have been fashioned with a chisel tap or two too few. The result went beyond virile, crossing the line into coarse. A touch too hulking to approach the suavity of, say, a Marcello Mastroianni. I kind of had a thing for him, by the way.

—Turn to Stone

Sound (and a little smell…)

The crows woke me. Each morning they started quietly enough, a murmur before first light. But as the breeze carrying the smell of fish and brine rolled in from the Back Bay, the chorus swelled in a long, droning crescendo, like cicadas, before erupting into a full-throated, rasping, demonic call to greet the rising sun. Even on days when it rained—which was the case for what seemed like half the year—the crows’ wake-up call was the only alarm I ever needed.

—Bombay Monsoon

Smell

DECEMBER 1968 - JIMMY If I’m being honest, the whole thing was my idea. Not that I dreamed it would ever turn out like it did, with my friend Artie zapped by 7,200 volts and blown clear out of his shoes, which he never laced up. But still, I never knew a jolt of electricity could do that. Artie’s hands were smoking, burnt like toast, and his hair and skin smelled like something from a cookout in hell.

    And, yeah, he was dead. Good and dead.

—THE PRANK

Taste

    “Is it true the Florentines don’t put salt in their bread because of some ancient blockade by the Pisans?” I asked. 

    “More likely because the Florentines were poor and didn’t want to pay the tax on salt. Whatever the reason, this stuff is an acquired taste.” 

    “I rather like it.” 

    “Sure. You’ve just buried it in salt and drowned it in olive oil.”

—Turn to Stone

Touch

In the wash of the morning’s sunlight, evidence of the mosquitoes’ transit became all too plain in the form of welts, stippled and swollen, on my arms, ankles, and neck. Larger bites than I was used to back home, and they itched like all get-out.

—Turn to Stone

All Five Senses

I remember the cool breath of the night woods on my neck. I see the glow of moonlight on the highest boughs, filtering down in a pale cast, weak and washed-out, fading into darkness. I smell the moss and the decay of the forest floor, heady, damp, musky. And I can taste the earthy mushrooms and bitter berries on my tongue. But most of all, I hear the pines whisper and sigh, their needles, like millions of tiny blades, carving voices into the breeze.
 —Heart of Stone

 

*********************

THE PRANK…enigmatic and unnerving. The pace never flags for a second. This is some masterly plotting. I loved it.”

—Liz Nugent, author of Strange Sally Diamond

 

“The Holdovers meets The Bad Seed,”

THE PRANK. A picture clipped from Playboy magazine, a missing Swiss Army Knife, and a prank gone terribly wrong conspire to make Christmas 1968 a deadly holiday to remember.

From two-time Edgar Award finalist, Anthony, Barry, and Macavity award-winner James W. Ziskin, THE PRANK releases July 2026.