I keep a collection of descriptions that have pulled me into the books I read. I’m fascinated how authors can–in just a few words–put me in the middle of their story and make me want to stay there. This one’s 161 Ways to Describe Weather.

A note: These are for inspiration only. They can’t be copied because they’ve been pulled directly from an author’s copyrighted manuscript (intellectual property is immediately copyrighted when published).

Evening

1. Evening shadows deepened into blue and purple.
2. The shadows retreated.
3. Sun was sinking toward the horizon, the pitiless white ball now an angry orange.
4. Fading afternoon in early June
5. Evening sky had turned to molten brass.
6. Sun still cast a faint yellow light through Slowly gathering evening.
7. Daylight had begun to drain away.
8. one-quarter of a moonlit night
9. cold light
10. silver-white moon hung
11. A half-moon rests in the fronds over our heads.
12. watching the horizon drain of color
13. The shadows slipped up the rocks as though the world were drowning in darkness.
14. deepening shadows made it a city of ghosts
15. barely visible in the fading light
16. the high heavens
17. Darkness settled around him.
18. watching the horizon drain of color
19. The shadows slipped up the rocks.
20. Evening was crisp already, the last of sunset just a fading pale stripe in the western sky.
21. darkening river
22. the moon golden at dawn, turn purple just before sunset in the rainy season, sometimes has white and black stripes created by volcanic ash, calm and clear sometimes attended by only a single cloud
23. humpback shapes of conical hills
24. The last rays of sun skimmed the surface.
25. late afternoon sun
26. velvety darkness
27. night shattered like a mirror
28. the Southern Cross lying on its side, the green meadow bathed in the humid light of the sinking sun
29. full dusk
30. The corners have just about disappeared into the shadows.

Night

1. black branches that traced the blue-black heavens overhead
2. far away down the night sky
3. full moon a pale blue-white disk
4. night sky dull black
5. Stars were remote pinpricks.
6. one-quarter of a moonlit night
7. cold light
8. silver-white moon hung
9. a half-moon rests in the fronds over our heads
10. inky blackness
11. Thick clouds blotted out the stars.
12. A thin layer of clouds masked the full moon, filling the room with blue light.

Day

1. Sun cast a luminescent glow.
2. The day was out of sync with his mood.

Sunny

1. beautiful, 82 degrees, mild breeze, cloudless sunshine, a day for looking at a ball game
2. The air was cool but the sun was out.

Windy

1. The wind blew itself out overnight.
2. a web of clouds, backlit by the failing sun, mist billowed through the trees and over the fields and hung low in the air, masking the camp in a ghostly gray
3. towering thunder clouds
4. Clouds threatening, but no rain predicted the 45-mile per hour gusts of drizzly wind.
5. dense fog
6. brown cloud that passes for air
7. a wedge of sunlight bursting past the narrow window
8. The wind was icy and withering.
9. Heads bowed against the gusting wind.

Dusty

1. Grit grated in his teeth. Dust was everywhere, blowing on the wind, leaving its scent in his nostrils.
2. as dust motes drifted

Horizon

1. thirty miles over the horizon
2. razor edge of the horizon

Fog/Mist

1. cinder dust and gloom
2. The haze floated over the crowd like smoke from a doused fire.
3. Sun hanging in a pink haze of clouds and smog.
4. Fog yellowed by agricultural burning.
5. Fog began to billow across the road in a great grey mass like the effluent of a thousand smokestacks. The building was only a shadowy form, almost entirely lost to view.
6. Headlamps of cars did little to pierce the gloom.
7. The mist floated like smoke out of the cypress in the swamp.

Cloudy

1. dark clouds drifting over the hills
2. night was pitch
3. slice of sky
4. thick clouds blotted out the stars
5. a thin layer of clouds masked the full moon, filling the room with blue light
6. cool restful shady world with light filtering lazily through the treetops that meet high overhead and shut out the direct sunlight
7. saw the anvil of cloud coming in. “A thunderstorm.”
8. Cumulus clouds falling down to the…
9. A light breeze whispered through the trees.
10. cloud shadows
11. first cumulus clouds darkening into thunderheads

Humid

1. hold humidity like a sponge holds water
2. thick heat of the growing morning
3. fierce humidity
4. windless heat
5. It was surprisingly hot. He could feel the sweat roll down his sides and the dampness of the box up against his chest.
6. Even with the breeze, the air remained thick and hot, and it stills tank of petroleum.

Sky

1. sky as gray-white and sunless
2. inky blackness
3. against the fading layers of orange, yellow

Morning

1. shoulders hunched against the early morning damp and cool
2. fused warm light of dawn now creeping down the summit
3. bathed in sunlight
4. gold shadow not three inches from his leg

Cold

1. his breath steaming in the air
2. Snow pelted his face and he pulled up the collar of his overcoat to further shield him from the bitter weather.
3. rubbed his arms

 Winter

1. A harsh winter wind blew out of a midnight sky. It roared out of the frigid north and thrashed the brooking forest. The force of it bent trees, whipping their bare branches like angry lashes. Shrieking across the river.
2. Cold was like that, seeping through her seven layers of clothing, attacking seams and zipper tracks and spots of thin insulation. The exposed skin on her face felt as if it had been touched with lit cigarettes.
3. frigid Friday morning
4. swirling snow
5. winter’s naked branches created a black tracework
6. The sun was climbing out of the deep well of winter, but it was still brutally cold.
7. winter colors daubed the land in colors of brown and gray
8. sunny, crisp and cool
9. The crisp air and clear sky energized his thoughts.

Rainy weather

1. grey wet morning
2. rain-swept and unpleasantly chilly
3. A flurry of rain stung my face.
4. Cold rain was beating down on my windshield.
5. The sky was leaden.
6. The wind was icy and withering.
7. Downpour started in the early evening and continued on through the night, a heavy pelting of water that thundered against rooftops and drowned out the sound of all else. By morning, city streets were shallow rivers rushing toward the ocean.
8. Rain ran down the window, the streets gleamed.
9. rain-swept
10. damp paving stones
11. By the time it reaches the ground, it has spent its energy.
12. windshield wipers barely keeping up with the cold, hard rain
13. The rain came steady and cold against the windshield and rattled on the roof of the car.
14. turned her head away and looked out my window, where it had gotten dark and shiny with the lights glistening off the rain.
15. The maple trees were black and slick in the rain, their bare branches shiny. The flower bed was a soggy matting of dead stems.
16. The sky was low and gray.
17. Air was swollen.
18. the rain was steady and warm and vertical
19. drizzly rain
20. The sleaty rain drizzled down, not very hard and not very fast, but steady.
21. Rain came down so hard it almost hurt, stinging the skin and blowing into the eyes and nose and mouth, but in the forest its fall is broken by the trees.
22. saw a distant flash of lightning, counted the seconds, and then said, “six miles, more or less.”

People in hot weather:

1. Heat wave hit, temperatures went soaring.
2. The heat hit them like a hand in the face.
3. strode into the dusk, into the stifling heat
4. The heat smacked the grin off his face.
5. Burst back into the blistering hot sun. Sweat immediately beaded across her brow. She could feel her T-shirt glue itself stickily to her skin.
6. I could feel the sweat form along my backbone and trickle down.
7. She slogged forward, feeling blotches of dark gray sweat bloom across the front of her T-shirt, while more trailed down the small of her back.
8. slogging across pavement as hot as ash in August.
9. white dress shirt, sharply pressed this morning, was now plastered against his chest
10. already short of breath, his lungs laboring as they headed down the path
11. still wrung out from working in the heat
12. Take your shirt off. Pop your underwear in the freezer. Dump a tray of ice cubes on your bed. Throw back some chilled vodka shots before you go to sleep.
13. The semi-drought slowly draining the life out of the grass and trees.
14. Only 7 in the morning, and already stocky hot. *** had a sheen across his forehead.
15. Sweat tricked from his forehead which he wiped with the back of his knotted, callused hand.
16. hundred degree heat, burning sun and parching salt
17. ninety-five outside, probably a hundred in the car. Not great weather for polyester suits
18. a fresh drop of sweat teared up on her brow and made a slow, wet path down the plane of her cheek
19. walking through a hair dryer
20. The heat slammed her like a blow.
21. *** cranked the air-conditioning. She stripped off her sweat-soaked clothes, climbed into the shower and scrubbed.
22. answered the phone while used the other hand to wipe the sweat from the back of her neck. God this heat was unbearable. The humidity level had picked up on Sunday and hadn’t done a thing to improve since.
23. *** thin green sundress was already plastered to her body while she could feel fresh dewdrops of moisture trickle stickily down between her breast.
24. Cradled the phone closer to her damp ear
25. Her face shiny with sweat.

Summer

1. Summer sun remained a brilliant, blinding white. No shade existed for miles and the heat rising up from the baked earth was brutal.
2. The summer heat came off the tarmac in waves.

Hot Weather

1. While the mercury climbed to a hundred degrees. Efforts started strong, then petered out. People got hot, got tired, got busy with other things—inside things.
2. Seemed to be bracing himself for leaving the cool comfort of air-conditioning behind and bursting once more into the heat
3. The heat settled in on them, rolling in like a heavy blanket and pressing them deep into their chairs while their clothing glued to their skin.
4. Even my teeth are sweating
5. The sun beat down relentlessly; even with the AC cranked up, she could feel the heat.
6. She could already feel sweat trickle down her back.
7. The sun burned white-hot overhead.
8. glass exploding from the heat of the sun
9. vanish in the dry season’s brown leaves

Click for the complete list of 69 writer’s themed descriptions.

–published first on Today’s Author

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Jacqui Murray is the author of the popular Building a Midshipman, the story of her daughter’s journey from high school to United States Naval Academy, the Rowe-Delamagente thrillers, and the Man vs. Nature saga. She is also the author/editor of over a hundred books on integrating tech into education, adjunct professor of technology in education, blog webmaster, an Amazon Vine Voice,  a columnist for TeachHUB and NEA Today, and a freelance journalist. Look for her next prehistoric fiction, Quest for Home, Fall 2019. You can find her tech ed books at her publisher’s website, Structured Learning