Yes, that’s what I do when I’m surprised. Some border on the melodramatic, some sound suspiciously like other emotions in the thesaurus (amazement, happiness, fear, anger, relief, and disappointment), and some are unintentionally humorous (“gripping the sides of the head”). Instead of saying “She felt surprised,” you look up surprise in the EMOTION THESAURUS and insert “Her mouth fell open and her hand flew to her chest after her fingers touched her parted lips and she gasped.” This, along with thirty other physical manifestations for surprise supposedly show the reader what the character is experiencing. For several years, editors and agents have recommended “showing” not “telling” and frequently use the Emotion Thesaurus as a means to show how it’s done.
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