Building Suspense And Creating Tension Part 1
Building Suspense and Tension – Part One
The most important thing you can do as a writer of fiction is make the reader want to turn the page.
In fact, there is no other job more important to a writer. If the reader doesn’t care what happens next in your story, then you’ve failed as a writer.
So to help you succeed in that regard, always keep in mind: suspense and tension are crucial to a good story. And without them, you haven’t got a story.
By it’s very nature, fiction entails a willing suspension of disbelief.
Ideally, fiction should be a heightened version of real life, where readers leave behind their boring, depressed, mundane lives to enter into a more dangerous, compelling, and magical world.
If fiction is a compressed version of reality, where everything boring and flat is left out, and only the interesting and exciting remain, then what are those remaining elements that make a story exciting, interesting, and intriguing?
How do authors build suspense and create tension?
A few of the elements used are:
- conflict – internal and external
- danger
- uncertainty
- withholding
Conflict – Like suspense or tension, conflict can be used at both the macro, or plot-level, or at the micro, or scene-level.
Your primary conflict will be the one between your protagonist (main character) and whatever force or person you choose to stand in opposition to them.
Conflict can be defined as opposing forces battling to fulfill the same goals, desires, or needs. Whether it’s socio-economic or class differences, tribal conflicts, warring tribes or gangs, or groups competing for the same precious resources like food or water.
Indeed the heart of a good story is the ability to pit character against character, or character against nature or other forces. The genre you’re writing in will determine which type of conflict you choose and you should have multiple levels of conflict throughout your story including internal and external conflict.
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Internal conflict is your character battling with themselves, whether against addiction or psychological issues or urges, they cannot control, is the perfect way to create suspense both at the plot level and at the scene level. Everyone struggles with inner demons. Who hasn’t at times been their own worst enemy? And self-sabotage is a great way to keep a protagonist’s life interesting to readers.
Most people struggle just to find happiness and love in this life. And in so doing, they end up making their lives even more miserable. Using character flaws, like overweening pride, vanity, or low self-esteem to trip up your characters keeps the tension high and the reader turning pages.
External conflict between friends, allies, or lovers, is a great way to build tension and create suspense throughout the story. No one likes to see good friends fight. Unless that is, they’re reading fiction. When best friends struggle with conflict, the reader is compelled to stick around and see how things will ultimately turn out.
Spats between friends can be used to infuse scenes with tension, and spice up scenes that might otherwise be yawn-inducing. Characters can disagree on almost anything – what restaurant to eat at, which bank to rob, who killed the most orcs, or the best way to raise a dragon.
External conflicts include:
- Person vs Person
- Person vs Thing
- Person vs Society
- Person vs Nature
- Person vs Technology
- Person vs Supernatural
Danger – There’s no more sure-fire way of creating tension or building suspense than putting your character in danger.
There are two main kinds of danger:
- physical
- psychological/emotional
Physical danger – Most readers find it nearly impossible to put down your book if your character’s safety or life is in danger.
Consider the following example:
As they prepared to open one of the boxes, Jill stopped and put her ear to the door. “Quick! Jack, hide!”
“What is it?”
“They’re coming!”
“WHO’S coming?”
“Beckett’s men! The last person they caught in here they beheaded in the town square!”
Jack’s heart pounded in his chest.
The footsteps outside were close and getting closer.
“Hurry! Get behind those boxes! Go! Go!” But it was too late. Before they could hide, the door wrenched open with a bang and light flooded the basement.
What reader in their right mind could put a book down at this point. Even if you ended the chapter here, chances are your reader would stay up a little longer just to find out what happens to your characters here.
Psychological danger – A deeper and more complex type of danger. As opposed to physical danger, psychological danger requires a bit more planning and forethought. While our characters’ physical safety might not be endangered, there are plenty of other ways to make their lives miserable.
Through the clever machinations of a cunning and malevolent antagonist, you can cost your characters their jobs, their marriage, their standing in the community, their self-respect, and even their sanity. All of which serve to build suspense and/or create and sustain tension throughout the story.
Psychological danger means to put at risk a character’s love or affection, their trust, respect, or standing. When one character shames, terrorizes, or bullies another, or otherwise endangers the emotional stability of a character, all of these can be considered psychological danger.
Next: Building Suspense and Creating Tension Part 2
