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Suspense in writing

9 tricks to write suspense fiction (General techniques)

- Difference between suspense and mystery: While suspense creates drama before the crisis event, mystery starts its thrill ride after the crisis event.

- While a mystery writer plays his cards close to his chest, giving little away to tease the reader, a suspense writer plays his cards open for all to see.

- Playing with an open hand, the suspense writer must create tension by inserting a strong protagonist and developing inventive story developments that

avert a certain outcome.

- For a good suspense story to work, whats at stake must be stated at the beginning of the story.

- The 9 tricks: - 1. Give the reader a lofty viewpoint - The reader should have foresight. Let the

reader see the viewpoints of both the protagonist and the antagonist.

- The reader sees the lines of convergence between the protagonist and antagonist and feels the consequences of the perils ahead.

- Also, this technique allows the writer to place emotional weight on the reader. The tension will build from the readers self-imposed fears of knowing that the hero is on a collision course with disaster.

- 2. Use time constraints The protagonist should be working against the clock, and the clock should be working for the bad guys.

- Every minute you shortchange the protagonist is another notch up on the burner under the readers seat.

- 3. Keep the stakes high - The story must be about a crisis thats devastating to the protagonists world, and the hero must be willing to do anything to prevent it from occurring.

- The crisis has to be important to ensure readers will empathize with the protagonist.

- 4. Apply pressure - The protagonist should be working under what seems to be insurmountable odds. All his skills and strengths must be stretched to the breaking

point in order to save the day.

- The hero should bend, but never buckle under the pressure the antagonist applies. There should be only one person left feeling helpless in the story, and thats the reader.

- 5. Create dilemmas. Suspense loves dilemmas - The antagonist needs to be throwing things at the protagonist that present awkward challenges or choices that

will test her caliber.

- The choice must seemingly be a lose-lose situation for the protagonist, i.e. choosing to save one person while leaving another to die, picking up a gun after

swearing an oath never to do so again or taking that offered drink after years of

sobriety.

- 6. Complicate matters Pile on the problems. Give the protagonist more things to do than he can handle. The hero has to be stretched wafer-thin.

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- The hero should be the guy trying to keep all plates spinning, while the antagonist is forever adding another plate to the line. By the end of the book, the protagonist

should be just barely preventing everything from crashing to the ground.

- 7. Be unpredictable - Nothing in life runs perfectly to plan for anyone. Make nothing straight-

forward for the protagonist. The hero shouldnt be able to rely on anything going right for her, and any step forward should come at a price. The antagonist

shouldnt go unscathed, either. - The sheer presence of the protagonist is going to gum up the antagonists plans,

which means the antagonist is going to have to improvise.

- Both players will have to be quick-witted to deal with any and all upsets, especially as the story progresses toward its climax.

- Remember, the protagonist and antagonist dont have to be the only monkey wrench in each others lives. Let outside forces be that, too other characters, circumstances or even the nature itself i.e. an earthquake

- 8. Create a really good villain - In a suspense novel, the bad guy is very visible. - The ultimate antagonists are smart and motivated. - Explore the antagonists motivations and character. Give the reader reasons why

the antagonist is who he is. The reader has to believe in and fear this person. The

villain has to be a worthy opponent to our hero. Anything else wont do. - 9. Create a really good hero - If the book has a great bad guy, then its going to

need a great hero. This may be key to any story, but the suspense hero has to be

someone the reader believes in and cares about. When the hero is in peril, the

writer needs for the reader to hope that person will pull through.

6 secrets to create and maintain suspense

1. Put characters that readers care about in jeopardy

- Four factors are necessary for suspensereader empathy, reader concern, impending danger and escalating tension.

- We create reader empathy by giving the character a desire, wound or internal struggle that readers can identify with. The more they empathize, the closer their

connection with the story will be. Once they care about and identify with a

character, readers will be invested when they see the character struggling to get

what he most desires.

- To get readers more invested in your novel, make clear: - 1) What your character desires (love, freedom, adventure, forgiveness, etc.); - 2) what is keeping him from getting it; - 3) what terrible consequences will result if he doesnt get it. - Suspense builds as danger approaches. - Depending on your genre, the threat may involve the characters physical,

psychological, emotional, spiritual or relational well-being. Whatever your genre,

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show that something terrible is about to happenthen postpone the resolution to sustain the suspense.

- We need to escalate the tension in our stories until it reaches a satisfying climax. Raise the stakes by making the danger more imminent, intimate, personal and

devastating.

2. Include more promises, less action

- Suspense happens in the stillness of your story, in the gaps between the action sequences, in the moments between the promise of something dreadful and its

arrival.

- The problem of readers being bored isnt solved by adding action but instead by adding apprehension. Suspense is anticipation; action is payoff.

- You dont increase suspense by making things happen, but by promising that they will.

- Stories are about transformations. We have to show readers where things are goingwhat situation, character or relationship is going to be transformed.

3. Keep every promise you make

- In tandem with making promises is the obligation of keeping them. The bigger the promise, the bigger the payoff.

- A huge promise without the fulfillment isnt suspenseits disappointment. - Readers want to predict what will happen, but they want to be wrong. Theyre

only satisfied when the writer gives them more than they anticipate, not less.

4. Let the characters tell readers their plans

- Im not talking about revealing your secrets or letting readers know the twists that your story has in store. Instead, just show readers the agenda, and youll be making a promise that something will either go wrong to screw up the schedule,

or that plans will fall into place in a way that propels the story (and the tension)

forward.

- A story moves through action sequences to moments of reorientation when the characters process what just happened and make a decision that leads to

the next scene.

- We do this in real life as wellwe experience something moving or profound, we process it, and then we decide how to respond. Problem is, in those moments

of reflection, a story can drag and the suspense can be lost. During every interlude

between scenes a promise must be either made or kept.

- And, if you resolve one question or plot thread (that is, you keep a promise you made earlier), introduce another twist or moral dilemma (in other words, make

another promise).

5. Cut down the violence

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- Its pointless to show 10 or more gruesome murders, instead show just one or two and let the killer on the loose.

- A murder is not suspense. Abduction with the threat of a murder is.

- Cut down on the violence and increase the readers apprehension about a future violent act.

-Because readers only feel suspense when they care about what happens to a

character, we want to heighten their concern by heightening the impact of the

tragedy. Show how valuable life is.

6. Be one step ahead of your readers

- As you develop your story, appeal to readers fears and phobias. Phobias are irrational fears, so to be afraid of a cobra is not a phobia, but to be afraid of all

snakes is.

- Make sure you describe the setting of your storys climax before you reach that part of the story.

- Countdowns and deadlines can be helpful, but can work against you if they dont feed the storys escalation. Start your countdown in the middle of the book. To escalate a countdown, shorten the time available to solve the problem.

- As you build toward the climax, isolate your main character. Remove his tools, escape routes and support system (buddies, mentors, helpers or

defenders). This forces him to become self-reliant and makes it easier for you to put him at a disadvantage in his final confrontation with evil.

- Make it personal. Dont just have a person get abductedlet it be the main characters son. Dont just let New York City be in dangerlet Grandma live there.

Other advice

- Make the reader care about the answer - Pose dramatic questions in time - between 1/6 and 1/3 of the way into your

story.

- Foreshadow hint to small clues in the story - Have a false success, where the protagonist thinks theyve solved the dramatic

question, they save the world, they solved the murder etc. and then pull the rug

from under them.

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Building Suspense: How to Keep the Audience on the Edge of Their Seat

- Evoke emotion Create sympathetic characters that the audience likes and can relate to. After all, the characters are the ones who are telling the majority of your

story, through their actions and dialogue.

- Create conflict At the heart of a compelling story is rising conflict. This is your chance to take the audience for a ride. If you craft a tight story with interesting

opposing forces, the audience will go along.

- Provide opposition The main character or characters need a powerful opposition; its not easy manipulation but the basis of most compelling drama when your protagonist has to face someone or something that stands between

them and their goal. The opposition should be in a position of strength. Your

audience should be rooting for your main character to overcome insurmountable

odds or a seemingly unbeatable enemy.

- Build expectation Give the audience the sense that something will happen, that there is an expectation for trouble.

- Increase tension Let the audience know something that your characters dont. If the audience is hooked, theyll want to know what happens, and if it matches what they believe.

- Use surprise Shocking, disturbing, unpredictable events i.e. killing your main character in the middle of the story.

- Create immediacy If your audience cares about your characters, then they will care about what they are fighting for. It should be a tangible, relatable goal that

people in some way can identify with.

- Establish consequences - This is tied in with creating immediacy. As your viewer gets more involved with your characters, they need to know that

something important or terrible will happen if your main character or characters

do not reach their goal.

- Limit time - Establishing a finite time for your protagonist to reach his or her goal increases the suspense.

- Maintain doubt Nothing kills suspense like a foregone conclusion. This doesnt mean to fill your script with red herrings, because this may frustrate and ultimately put off your audience. But if you build suspense in a meaningful way,

and leave room for doubt, you can draw the viewer in and keep them thinking and

guessing.

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41 ways to create and heighten suspense Ian Irvine

Story - At its simplest, a story consists of a character (the hero) who wants something

badly, and an adversary (the obstacle) who is trying equally hard to prevent the hero from

getting what he wants. In each scene, the hero attacks his problem in a new way, the

adversary fights back and the hero either fails or his initial success leads to a bigger

problem.

- The reader's hope that the hero will succeed, and fear that he will fail, creates rising suspense until the climax, where the hero's goal or problem is resolved.

- Suspense comes from readers' anticipation of what's going to happen next. Therefore, never tell your readers anything in advance when, by withholding it,

you can increase suspense.

A. CHARACTERS

For maximum suspense, you should not use any old character. Readers are only going to

worry about, and identify with, characters they care about ones who are both sympathetic and interesting.

1. Sympathetic characters are (after Brown): In trouble, or suffering in some way;

Underdogs. It's difficult to empathize with a hero who is strong, powerful

and has everything going for him, but everyone cheers when the underdog wins;

Vulnerable, ie they can be killed, trapped, enslaved, destroyed politically

or professionally, or ruined financially or socially. Vulnerability can come from the

character's own physical, mental or emotional shortcomings and conflicts as well

as from the machinations of the adversary; and

Deserving because of their positive character traits (optimism, courage,

steadfastness, selflessness, compassion etc). A character can be in trouble, an

underdog and vulnerable, but if he's also lazy, selfish or a whining liar readers

won't identify with him or care what happens to him, and his troubles will create

little suspense. This doesn't mean the character can't be a villain. If he's acting for

the best of reasons and the good outweighs the bad, readers will identify with him.

2. Characters are likely to be interesting if (see Brown for a detailed analysis) they're important, unusual or extraordinary. One reason we love to read about such

characters is wish-fulfillment living our lives through the story, feeling the characters' hopes and fears, and being awed by their achievements. Characters may be

more interesting if they're:

Powerful because of noble birth, wealth, high office, rank or position, intelligence or strength;

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Naturally gifted or highly skilled at something important or useful;

Unusual (in appearance, a rare ability or an amazing life experience),

extraordinary, strange, eccentric or downright weird;

Physically attractive, funny, dangerous or mysterious; or

Surprising (they don't fit the stereotype of their character type).

Your characters should also be as different as possible, since they will often be working

together. Having highly contrasting characters maintains reader interest, multiplies the

potential for conflict with the hero and will suggest many new subplot possibilities.

To build suspense through your characters:

3. They must have goals. Common goals are: to survive, escape, win the contest or battle, become

the leader, achieve their destiny, master the art, free the slaves or change the world;

The moment your hero forms a goal, readers will hope she achieves it and worry about what will happen if she doesn't;

Sometimes the goal (eg to survive or escape) will only appear after the

character is confronted with the problem (being stalked by a killer, trapped in a

bushfire).

4. A strong hero needs a strong opponent. The opponent isn't necessarily a villain. It can be a good person who strongly disagrees with the hero, a force of nature (flood,

forest fire, epidemic), a beast or alien, or an uncaring society. But when it is a villain:

He should be at least as strong as the hero, and preferably stronger. You

can't make a strong story when the hero's opponent is weak;

Evil villains are a clich, and pure evil is both boring and predictable, so

make your villain human. Reveal his admirable side, make his motivations clear,

show why the bad things he does make perfect sense to him, and you'll create a far

more chilling antagonist;

If the villain is largely in the background, strengthen him by revealing

how much and why everyone fears him. Show his power growing via his victories,

one after another;

Give him advantages the hero lacks, fanatical supporters, and the power to

lure away the hero's allies.

5. Tailor your characters to maximize suspense (for details, see Lukeman and the other refs):

A cautious hero won't go down the crumbling mine shaft, but an impulsive

or reckless hero will plunge in. A coward won't jump into the sea to rescue

drowning passengers, a brave man will do so instinctively. If the hero has a phobia,

such as a fear of rodents, send her into a ruin full of rats;

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Often the hero's biggest limitation will be himself. Does he have the

strength of will to confront the woman who betrayed him, or will he keep putting

put it off? Is he plagued by self-doubt, or a cock-eyed optimist who believes things

will come right in the end despite all evidence to the contrary?

Does the hero have a destiny, eg to become the next lord, president of the

company, or to be the catalyst for revolution? Is this destiny foretold in the story,

or is it something he's known since birth? Is it a positive destiny, an unbearable

burden or a dark and dangerous threat? Will he achieve it, or fail? And either way,

what are the consequences to him and to others?

Create loose cannon characters. No one knows what they'll do next and

their unpredictability heightens suspense. Will the reformed drunk crack under

pressure and start drinking again? Will the self-effacing heroine snap when pushed

too far, and explode?

6. Take away the hero's ability to defend herself (or others) and you create intense suspense:

She's being stalked in the dark, but drops her only weapon and can't find

it; she's injured and can't escape her enemy; her foot is trapped in a crack and she

can't get it out; or she's paralyzed by terror or self-doubt;

She sees her friend heading across the rotten bridge but is too far away to

warn her; she rides to the rescue of an ally, knowing she's going to arrive too late;

He fails under pressure he could save the day with a magic spell but forgets the words, or gets them wrong with disastrous consequences;

His efforts are in vain his son is suicidal depressed and he can't get through to him;

She believes that her fate (or a friend's, or the country's) is fixed by destiny

and nothing can change it.

7. Use rapidly changing emotions to build suspense. By showing the hero's emotions changing rapidly in response to some threat or confrontation you can build

suspense to a crescendo that will bring your readers to the edge of their seats, eg:

Vague unease becomes fear becomes terror becomes shrieking hysteria;

Irritation becomes annoyance becomes anger becomes murderous rage.

8. Create anticipation and expectation. The more your hero dwells on or worries about some forthcoming event

(good or bad) the more suspenseful it will be when the event is about to occur a shy girl fretting about her wedding night; a young recruit marching to battle, sick

with fear;

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Have the hero make a complicated plan and be rashly confident that it will

succeed. This will worry your readers because they know it's going to go wrong;

Build up the hero's anticipation (of winning the contest, gaining the prize,

getting the girl) into expectation. Then, when he fails, the blow will be bitter. He

hasn't been beaten by the failure, but by his defeated expectation.

9. Employ romantic and sexual tension. For variety or to further the plot, action-related suspense can be alternated with suspense arising from romantic or sexual

tension between characters. Heighten suspense by:

Creating barriers to the relationship love between enemies, between a human and an alien, a lover with a dark past or terrible secret;

Or by using obstacles to keep the lovers apart.

10. Use micro-tension the moment-by-moment tension that keeps readers in suspense over what'll happen in the next minute. (See Don Maass's terrific book The

Fire in Fiction for details). Micro-tension comes from the 'emotional friction' between

characters as they try to defeat each other. The characters aren't necessarily enemies,

though. There should be tension between any two characters, whether they are

opponents, servants, friends, allies or lovers. There should also be tension within the

character due to inner conflicts.

In dialogue, show: the hero's doubt or disbelief about what the other

character is saying; the disagreement about goals or plans; the disdain, dislike,

contempt or concealed hatred; the power struggles, and ego and personality

clashes; bring out inner conflicts in what each character says and does;

Often action can be lacking in tension because we've seen it a thousand

times before there are only so many ways two people can have a sword fight. To make action suspenseful, get inside the head of the hero to show his conflicting

feelings and emotions during the struggle. Then, break the action clich by

showing subtle visual details that give the reader a clear and vivid picture of this

particular scene rather than any generic action scene;

Use similar techniques when writing sex or violence. Show the key

moments with a handful of striking visual images. Bring out the hero's conflicting

feelings and emotions at each moment, focusing on subtle emotions rather than the

obvious ones such as (in sex scenes) passion, lust or tenderness;

When the character is thinking or emoting, create suspense by (a) cutting

restated thoughts, feelings & emotions and (b) making thoughts and emotions

realistic. For instance, the hero may be outwardly happy, but is concealing or

fighting some niggling worry. Or struggling with an inner conflict (justice versus

vengeance, duty to an bad leader vs. personal honor);

In descriptive passages and quiet moments, show little details that make

the setting vividly real and establish the mood of the place. Describe the hero's

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conflicting feelings and emotions, focusing on subtle emotions rather than obvious

ones.

B. PROBLEM

The story begins when your character confronts a problem she has to solve, or forms a

goal she's determined to achieve. Problems can be of three kinds: a danger, a want or

lack, or a puzzle or mystery. Dangers and lacks arouse suspense because the reader hopes

the character will solve her problem, yet fears the consequences if she fails. Puzzles and

mysteries create suspense through curiosity the reader wants to know the answer.

11. Put your characters (or their friends or allies) in danger (for details see the references, especially Brown, Lyon and Lukeman).

Dangers can be: physical (a threat to life, health or vital functions such as

eyesight, mobility or intellect); sexual (assault, pregnancy, disease); psychological

(abuse, bullying, brainwashing); emotional; or moral (being led into crime,

corruption or depravity);

Dangers can also threaten: the character's relationships (love, friendship,

family, clan, group or society); her profession, trade, career or art; her property,

possessions or prospects; her sanity; her freedom;

Alternatively, your character could be a danger to others (he's violent, a

rapist, a psychopath or just reckless), or to himself (depressed, suicidal or reckless);

Expose the hero to his darkest fear if he's claustrophobic, trap him in a lift or a dungeon. Alternatively, make the imaginary seem vividly real (eg someone

who is paranoid or psychotic).

12. Give your character a want or lack that she's desperate to fulfill. To find love or romance, support or friendship;

To escape from a blighted community or life;

To master a skill, disciple or art, or realize a dream.

13. Pose a mystery or puzzle. In some kinds of stories, particularly crime and mystery, suspense mainly comes from the puzzle the author has set, and readers'

curiosity about how the hero will solve it and what the answer is (see (26 and (27)).

14. Force the hero to face the problem. Either: She has no choice because she can't get away. She's trapped in a locked

building, slave camp, spacecraft or bureaucratic maze;

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She has a choice but walking away would violate her own moral or ethical

code. Eg, she's on the run but sees a child in danger and has to help, no matter the

risk to herself;

He has a choice but walking away would violate his professional duty to

act a munitions expert who has to defuse a bomb; a priest who must exorcise a demon;

He initially refuses but is talked (or talks himself) into it.

15. Raise the stakes. You can either raise the prize for succeeding, or raise the price of failure

or, preferably, both at the same time;

These consequences can either apply to the hero, to people he cares for, or

those he has a duty to (eg a doctor looking after a critically ill patient);

Remember that both the prize and the price are relative if the emperor wins or loses a skirmish it may be trivial, whereas winning or losing his first battle

will change the life of a young lieutenant.

16. Make the problem more difficult to solve. Increase the likelihood that the character will lose, then show what the

specific personal consequences will be;

Threats to the viewpoint character and his friends and family will arouse

far more reader anxiety, and create more suspense, than problems facing people he

doesn't know, or people in another province or country.

17. Shorten the deadline. Constantly remind your hero of the time limit;

Then cut it in half;

Slow down key scenes to heighten suspense. Show them in greater than

normal detail to bring readers right into the moment.

18. Break reader expectations. Readers are constantly guessing what's going to happen next, based on

stories they've read before, but if they know what's going to happen, suspense dies;

Analyze the hero's problem and come up with unusual twists and

reversals, new problems and difficult conflicts that will confound reader

expectations of what's going to happen.

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C. PLOT

Plot is made up of the hero's successive actions get what he wants (ie to solve the story

problem) and the opponent's corresponding actions to stop him. To build suspense to an

explosive pitch at the climax of the story, each new action by the hero needs to be

blocked by his opponent, and either fails or leads to an even bigger problem until the climactic scene where the story problem is finally resolved one way or another.

19. Make the story problem clear. A surprising number of manuscripts fail to set out either:

What the hero's real problem or goal is;

Or the nature of the obstacle or antagonist that's trying to stop him

achieving this goal;

Or only do so many pages into the story.

The real story doesn't begin until the hero formulates a goal and takes action to get it (see

Cleaver, Immediate Fiction). Until this happens there can be little suspense or story

interest, so make the hero's goal clear as early as possible.

20. Put the hero at a disadvantage. Examples: At the beginning, the hero may not know how to solve her problem; or

may not understand what the real problem is (eg, she's mistaken about her real

enemy);

She lacks the skills to solve her problem (eg needs magic but doesn't have

any; has a gift for magic but doesn't know how to use it);

She has critical personality flaws, eg her obsession with gaining justice for

her murdered mother blinds her to vital friendships; his violent past leaves him

paralyzed with guilt; his racism leads him to refuse the aid of the one person who

can help him;

She's handicapped physically, mentally, emotionally

21. Increase the pressure in unpredictable ways (for details, see the references, especially Lyon):

Test the hero's abilities to breaking point. Take away her friends and

supporters, undermine her assets and any options she's relying on, block her escape

routes, cut the deadline in half, devalue her strongest beliefs or the things she most

cares about. Anything that can go wrong, should go wrong not just for her, but for everyone;

Give her more simultaneous problems than anyone can handle, so she

makes damaging mistakes. Distract her with an unexpected sexual attraction. Have

disagreements escalate out of control. Give her an impossible dilemma that will

trouble her for ages.;

Thwart her at every turn. If she's relying on aid, information or some

object or talisman, have it fail to appear, or be stolen, lost or destroyed when it's

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almost within her grasp. If she has a vital talent or skill, rob her of the ability to use

it when she needs it most;

Arouse suspicion about some of her friends or allies, or use dramatic irony

(see (23), below) to make readers suspect them even if the hero does not. Have a

trusted ally betray her, desert her or go over to the enemy;

Foreshadow her fate or peril, to the audience and other characters even if

not to herself. Use mysterious documents or eerie settings or symbols to create

uneasiness, or show that things are not as they seem;

Have the hero lose contact with her mentor; injure the hero; use forces of

nature (weather, fire, flood, difficult terrain) to block her;

Plant red herrings. Have the hero jump to false conclusions that lead her in

the wrong direction or to make disastrous mistakes, or to fall into a trap. Have

failures caused by misunderstandings or poor communication;

Set the action within some greater conflict (cultural renaissance, political

drama, social upheaval, war, religious persecution) or tailor social institutions to

make everything more difficult (paranoid government, martial law, police state,

secret society);

Create an emotional time bomb (something vitally important to the hero)

then, at some critical time, have it destroyed or lost;

Lull the hero (and readers) into a false sense of security by having things

go too well for a scene or two, then create a disaster;

Show the hero thinking over past events and seeing something she missed

that's worrying or ominous. Or, when it's too late, coming to a dreadful realization.

22. Create conflict with everyone and everything. With the opponent see (4) above; With family, friends and allies see (10) above; With people the hero meets on the way they may be hostile, unreliable,

treacherous, incompetent or give false or incorrect information;

With the setting (see 25) below, including landscape, weather, culture,

politics, bureaucracy, religion;

Inner conflict see (22) below.

23. Create inner conflicts and dilemmas. Give the hero impossible challenges or agonizing choices that test his

courage, skill & moral fiber;

Force a good man to make invidious choices, eg between informing on his

corrupt mother or betraying his country;

A girl sees two friends in danger and can only save one. How does she

decide whom to save and whom to let die?

Make the hero choose between strongly held ideals (duty/honor,

family/justice). Force a pacifist to fight. Require a reformed drunk to drink.

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24. Use dramatic irony (ie, your readers know something vital that the characters aren't aware of):

The heroine is enjoying a glass of wine by the fire, unaware that the killer

is looking in through the window. She's not anxious, but readers are on the edge of

their seats;

The hero doesn't realise that he's got things disastrously wrong, but it's

obvious to the reader (and perhaps to other characters, too);

Write some scenes from the villain's viewpoint so readers can worry about

the trap closing on the unsuspecting hero;

A character bears vital or troubling news but events conspire to delay (or

prevent) its delivery to those who need to know.

25. Use the unknown to create anxiety. Set a scene where some terrible disaster or tragedy once occurred. The

place need not necessarily be dangerous, but fear of the unknown or the past will

make it seem so;

Arouse fear of some danger the character has to face this could be a real-life danger (fighting a monster, swimming a flooded river) or an uncanny one

(spending the night in a ghost-ridden graveyard);

Or an everyday ordeal (a daunting interview; meeting the girlfriend's

parents; sitting a difficult exam).

26. Put your hero in a perilous place. Analyze your scene settings and work out how you can change them to heighten tension:

Move the scene to a dangerous or unpredictable place. Instead of a park,

use a derelict factory, a minefield or a sinking ship;

Make an everyday place seem dangerous, eg. the hero must race across a

rugged landscape in a fog;

Change the scene from day to night, good weather to bad, peace to riot or

war, or put the hero in the middle of a plague epidemic.

27. Create mysteries. As noted above, mysteries and puzzles create suspense both because the hero has to work them out and because the reader wants to know the

answer.

How did the disaster occur?

How did a good man (or company, or nation) take this fatal step into

crime, addiction, insanity or war?

Is this document true, or a despicable lie?

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What do these clues mean?

Why is this device or talisman here and how is it

28. Design puzzles. These can either be intellectual or physical: Intellectual riddles, conundrums, paradoxes, illusions etc; Physical how do I get in or out? Locked room mysteries. Puzzles

requiring dexterity.

29. Leave issues and crises unresolved (especially at chapter or scene endings) and tension will rise because readers long for the resolution. Uncertainty and anticipation

are interlinked and create suspense:

Uncertainty can be heightened with unexpected twists, sudden reversals

and shocking disasters;

Foster anticipation by having the characters set out their goals, then by

using omens, portents and foreshadowing to arouse unease about the goals being

met;

Within scenes, heighten reader anticipation by using distractions and

interruptions to delay longed-for meetings, confrontations, resolution of an

important event, delivery of vital news etc.

30. Use reversals. Reversals of the expected are used to break expectations, clichs and repetition.

Lead your readers in a particular direction in order to create expectations

about the outcome, then throw in a reversal that breaks the expectation. This

heightens readers' anticipation, and thus suspense, because they have no idea what's

going to happen now.

Scour your story for clichd character types, plot elements, emotions,

dialogue, action and reactions, then use reversals where appropriate to break the

clich.

Do the same where you find repetition of character types, plot elements,

emotions, dialogue, action and reactions.

31. Secrets. The existence of a secret creates suspense because readers want to know the answer:

Rarely, a big secret can form the suspense backbone for a whole novel,

such as: Who was the traitor? What happened to the money? The secret has to be

developed throughout the story by drip-feeding clues that heighten the secret rather

than revealing it;

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Smaller secrets can be used to heighten suspense within scenes, eg the

Hogwarts letter withheld from Harry Potter in the first book of the series, and the

mysterious event (the Triwizard Tournament) which people keep alluding to early

in the fourth book.

32. Use subtext (see Lyon for details). Subtext is 'everything hidden from the awareness or observation of non-viewpoint characters'. Subtext based on rising

tension will create suspense. Some sources are:

The hero's physical state, feelings and emotions: eg, tears forming, sexual

attraction or lust, concealed hatred, a need to throw up;

Hidden agendas, ie the character's private thoughts, intentions and plans;

In the natural environment: a red glow over the forest, the ground shaking,

the call of a wild beast;

In the built environment: a patch of oil on the stair, a pram on the edge of

the railway platform;

Other characters' behavior or body language: man sharpening a dagger,

child playing near a cliff edge.

33. Turn a dramatic event into a question. Beware of having the event completely answer a question or resolve a problem, as this undercuts suspense. Instead, have the

event raise more questions, which draws out the suspense:

For small events, draw out the answer over a few sentences or paragraphs.

Eg, policeman knocks on the door late at night. Instead of revealing upfront that the

man's wife is dead, draw out the mystery about how the crash occurred and what's

happened to her;

For major events, the resolution can be drawn out over pages or even

chapters;

Scour the story for questions that deflate suspense because they're

answered too soon, and draw out the answer.

34. Make it worse. There's no problem so bad that you can't make it worse, and you should

take every opportunity to do so. But why would you want to?

Because character is revealed not in good times but in adversity. The

worse you can make it for the hero, the more his true character will be revealed by

what he does, the more the reader will worry about him and the greater the

suspense.

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D. STRUCTURE

Readers read to identify with the characters and live their stories, suffering the ordeals the

characters go through, worrying about them and dreading that they'll fail to achieve their

goals, yet hoping and praying that they'll succeed. At the end, readers want to see the

characters resolve their problems, and long for that tidal wave of relief when all the

dramatic tension and suspense built up through the story is finally released. To build

suspense, the novel needs careful structuring to:

a. Clearly present the hero and his goal to the reader in the beginning; b. Portray the hero's increasingly difficult struggle to defeat the adversary and

achieve the goal;

c. End scenes and chapters in ways that create reader uncertainty and anticipation (see (28) above; and

d. Show how the hero achieves his goal (or not) at the climax, then satisfyingly release all the built-up tension.

35. Structure the beginning to create suspense (see Brown for details): Create a hero who is both sympathetic and interesting (see (1) and (2)

above);

Set out the story problem (ie the hero's goal) clearly, and why he must

pursue this goal;

Reveal the obstacle (the adversary or force that's trying to prevent the hero

from achieving his goal);

Twist both the characters and the goal to break stereotypes, freshen the

story and surprise the reader.

36. Tailor the hero's actions to heighten suspense: In each scene, the hero faces some problem related to her goal. The actions she takes to solve the problem should

either:

Partially succeed, though worryingly (she finds a clue to the murder, but

following it will lead her into greater danger);

Succeed but lead to a bigger problem (he kills the giant spider but now

another hundred are hunting him); or

Fail and make the problem worse (she breaks into the enemy's fortress to

steal the documents, but they're not there and now she's trapped).

37. Vary the hero's fortunes to maintain and heighten suspense throughout the story. If every scene runs at fever pitch and ends disastrously, the law of

diminishing returns sets in the reader becomes desensitised to the drama, and suspense dies;

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Instead, alternate tense action or drama scenes with calmer ones, and end a

few scenes with the hero succeeding, and with moments of peace, happiness or

hope. Variety in endings maintains suspense because the reader knows the success

is only temporary; the opponent will never give up trying to defeat the hero;

To heighten suspense, make the hero's failures progressively worse, and

his dark moments bleaker, towards the climax.

38. Sequence the antagonist's reactions to progressively heighten the hero's troubles. Look at each scene from the antagonist's point of view and ask how he can

make things worse for the hero. What action will cause the hero the most trouble,

and what's the worst time it can occur?

To heighten suspense, make these troubles progressively worse towards

the climax, until it seems impossible that the hero can win.

39. Heighten critical scenes. Identify the key events in the story (those moments of intense drama that are also turning points) because they need to be carefully set up and

treated differently (see Lyon). Key events can be positive (love scenes, celebrations at

war's end, the award of prizes or honors) or crises (murders, defeat in battle, guilty

verdicts, terrible realizations). Build suspense by:

Foreshadowing the coming event to raise worrying questions and create

reader anticipation. This can be done via characters thinking about or debating the

possibility (eg of war), and making plans and preparations for the worst, as well as

by omens, foretelling, signs and symbols;

Writing a small scene or moment which hints at the coming critical scene

(a burning house hints at the violence and ruin of war); a shouting match

foreshadows the murder to come;

Then a reversal a moment that's the opposite of the coming critical scene. Eg, in a trial, the overconfident defense lawyer has a lavish lunch with

friends before returning to hear a shattering guilty verdict; immediately before the

joyous wedding, the couple have a furious argument; the soldier relaxes with his

family before going to bloody war. This contrast makes the critical scene far more

powerful;

In the critical scene, use all the dramatic techniques at your disposal to

raise the scene to a higher peak of suspense than anything that has gone before;

Afterwards, make sure the hero emotes about all that has happened,

reviews how the event has made his problems worse, and reformulates his plans.

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40. Climax, Resolution and Endings. Vary your scene endings to maximize suspense. Some scenes should end

at moments of high drama, many with unanswered questions, several with

shocking twists, a few with emotional completion, and some with no more than a

wry observation or pithy phrase.

The climax of the story, where the greatest obstacle is overcome and the

hero's story problem is finally resolved one way or another, is the biggest of all the

critical scenes and must coincide with the highest point of tension and suspense.

If the greatest tension occurs in a scene before the climax, the ending of

the story will be anticlimactic and the reader will feel let down.

If the story's resolution is weak, contrived, over too quickly or in any other

way fails to match the build-up of suspense to the climax, readers will be bitterly

disappointed;

In most novels, all the key questions will be answered by the end, and the

resolution provides a sense of completion plus the blissful release from suspense

that readers are waiting for. Some stories may end with a dilemma, however the main story has been resolved but there's still a question raised in the reader's mind

about what choice the hero will make.

Stories which are part of a series should resolve most of the story

questions at the end, but the overarching series question (eg will Harry Potter

defeat Lord Voldemort) remains and creates ongoing suspense until the series ends.

41. In editing. Review the story scene by scene, rate each scene out of 10 for its level of

suspense, then plot the sequence of suspense ratings. Ideally the graph should be a

zigzagging line rising progressively to the climax of the story, then falling away in

the resolution.

Does the story have flat periods with little suspense? Insufficient breaks

from high suspense? The highest suspense occurring before the climax?

Suspenseful moments that are too quickly resolved? Critical scenes where the

suspense is too low, too brief or too similar to other scenes? A powerful climax

ruined by a weak resolution? Work out how to fix these problems.

Common scene problems that lower suspense include: lack of a clear goal

for the scene; stakes too low; lack of an obstacle or weak obstacle; too little

conflict; too much thought or talk and not enough action; too much action and not

enough thought, emotion or reflection; no twist or disaster at the end (see Lyon for

a detailed analysis).

Analyze your characters (see (2) above). Can you modify or change

certain character traits to vary the kinds of suspense in the story, and to heighten it

in key scenes?