Writer to writer: From think to ink - Gail Carson Levine 2014
Nail-biting
Hatching the plot
Okay, we’ve got conflict, essential for an exciting story, but Grace commented, “I still struggle to heighten the tension.”
Here are ten ways to do that in no particular order; some are driven by situation, some by character:
1. Time pressure. Not every story has it; not every story needs it. But if time pressure comes into the plot naturally, hooray! The clock ticks. The reader’s heart pounds—if he remembers. Our job is to remind him. The deadline, whatever it is, has to loom, which we can accomplish by various means: with count-down chapter headings; in worried thoughts; in scenes that show how unprepared our MC Fiona is; in dialogue, when a tutor, for example, reminds her how few days are left until the exam that will determine her fate.
2. A milestone. Fiona is traveling toward some important destination—a long-lost parent, a new home, the answer to a mystery. In this case, the chapter headings can be miles remaining or train stops to go. The reason that makes the destination critical can be told in flashbacks along the way.
3. Thoughts. If Fiona worries, our reader is likely to worry too. We don’t want her to worry obsessively—unless that’s what she always does—but we do want to drop in a few thoughts about possible disaster every so often. As an added benefit, worries are a great way to end a chapter when we don’t have an actual cliffhanger handy.
4. Nonstop action. A chase story would be an example of this. Fiona is pursued by a villain who’s after the golden charm on her silver charm bracelet, which was given to her at birth by an eccentric aunt. As soon as she thinks she’s escaped, the villain pops up again.
5. Separation from the problem. Suppose Fiona, whose enemy is Luke, has to go on a class wilderness week. What is he doing while she’s away? What’s going to greet her on her return? If we aren’t writing in first person, we can even show what Fiona is going to walk into. Of course, the wilderness week has to be interesting too.
In The Two Princesses of Bamarre the MC, Addie, sets out to find the cure for her sister’s fatal disease. While the two are apart and when Addie is deprived of her magic spyglass, she keeps worrying that her sister’s condition has worsened. I wanted the reader to worry too. What if Meryl has already died?
6. A flaw in your MC. In The Two Princesses of Bamarre again, Addie is a coward. The reader fears that she won’t find the courage to help her sister.
7. A flaw in a secondary character. Suppose Fiona’s boyfriend is treacherous or unpredictable—kind one minute, mean the next. His character flaw is a source of tension. Any sort of flaw can work: forgetfulness, clinginess, selfishness, stinginess, and so on. We simply have to set it up so that Fiona needs something that the flawed character can’t be counted on to supply.
8. Isolation. Fiona can wander away from the other campers in her wilderness group and get lost. Wildcats live in these hills. Their habitat is shrinking, and they’re hungry. Aaa!
9. Expectation. Mom expects Fiona to be a brilliant student in every subject. Or, going the opposite way, Mom always expects her to fall short. Her best friend expects her to sacrifice her needs for his again and again. Or Fiona has hard-to-live-up-to expectations of herself.
10. Injustice. Fiona has been falsely accused. She’s misunderstood. In my book Dave at Night, Dave’s precious carving of Noah’s ark has been stolen. Much of the book’s tension comes from the search for it and worry about the repercussions that may follow its recovery.
Reread a few books that you couldn’t put down long enough to brush your teeth. Study the author’s suspense techniques and see how you might apply them to your story.
Tension is particularly needed when we close a chapter. A good chapter ending makes the reader want to—have to—keep reading. More than anywhere else in a book, the chapter ending has to compel or tempt the reader forward, because otherwise that page turn is such an invitation to turn off the flashlight under the covers or to answer all those text messages that have been piling up.
One fundamental principle underlies chapter endings: something should be amiss. If one problem has been solved, another should rise from the horizon or come forward from the background.
How to achieve those irresistible last lines or last paragraphs? I’ve gone through my Fairies and the Quest for Never Land for some of the ways:
• A cliffhanger. A chapter in Fairies ends with my MC, Gwendolyn, falling out of the sky toward a circle of sharks with their mouths open.
• Worry. The second chapter ends with Gwendolyn worrying that Peter Pan will forget to come for her. The worries of a sympathetic secondary character will do also. In Fairies, I ended nine out of thirty-two chapters with a worry.
• The villain is plotting or doing something awful, unbeknownst to your MC. We can show this only from a third-person POV.
• The beginning of a major event. Peter does come for Gwendolyn. I end the chapter in which he arrives at the moment before the two meet.
• A single powerful word. Chapter 8 ends, “Then a new miracle began.” Miracle is the magic word. Of course what follows has to live up to the promise, has to be a miracle, even if a minor one.
• An emotional moment. Suppose your MC has just unwittingly insulted a friend. The chapter can end when he realizes what he’s done, before the friend has reacted, because anticipation is a crucial factor in chapter endings.
• A threat. After the unwitting insult, the friends argue without reconciling. The chapter ends with the hurt friend saying, “I’ll get you for this.”
• A surprise. The readers’ suspicions are lulled. Things have been going pretty well. Someone shrieks. End of chapter.
• The absolute worst happens. End the chapter. But the absolute worst can’t happen many times in a single book. You can get away with a few absolute worsts, but probably not many, unless you’re writing over-the-top comedy.
I’m sure there are more terrific ways to end a chapter, and you’ll find ones that particularly suit your book. Be on the lookout for them as you write.
And, to close with the obvious, a book doesn’t have to be organized into chapters. P.S. Longer Letter Later by Ann M. Martin and Paula Danziger is an epistolary novel (a novel in letters and other documents), in which the breaks come at the end of each letter. Monster by Walter Dean Myers is written in the form of a screenplay. Anne Frank’s Diary of a Young Girl is made up of real diary entries. Some books are a hodgepodge of letters, notes, newspaper articles, journal pages, as well as narrative.
Writing time!
Tension can enter just about every situation. Here I am, typing at my computer. Suppose the words that appear on my screen aren’t the words I’m typing. I would freak out, and a reader probably would too. So the prompt is: As you do whatever you’re doing today, think about how each action (putting on your socks, eating lunch, passing a store window), or each place (your bedroom, classroom, local park, a city street) could be suspenseful. Write down the ideas that come to you. Use one or more of them in a story.
Have fun, and save what you write!