Momentary suspense
The little things you create in the middle of a scene are momentary suspense. You can use it to keep the reader's hands on the scroll.
Hitchcock often explained the difference between accident and suspense in the following way:
The accident was that two people were sitting at the dining room table, when a bomb suddenly exploded under the table. The suspense is that the audience hears the time bomb timer ticking under the table, but does not know when it will explode.
This key distinction leads to an ultimate tool for boosting suspense that you can use at almost any plot point, which is the microscopic obstacle.
A microscopic obstacle is a seemingly insignificant event, or something, or a character, when it enters the scene, with the potential of a huge and complex side-by-side.
Do it
1. Find scenes that are more than two pages long and not strong in suspense. It could be two people talking in a restaurant, or a colleague exchanging ideas in an office.
2. Make a list of potential obstacles that can be introduced, arranged from largest to smallest. Keep thinking until you write nine or ten obstacles.
Do not edit yourself. These obstacles can be other characters, sounds, weather, accidents (big or small), annoyances, and so on.
3. Select an obstacle and insert the middle part of this scene.
After a few such trainings, the creative mind can enter a state of automatic work, intuitively knowing where to insert a small obstacle. In this way, the purpose of the training is also achieved.
Raise your stakes
When the stakes are raised, the risks are raised and the potential losses are more severe.
In fiction, you can raise your stakes in three ways: plot, characters, and society.
* Plot bets
When the intensity of the exciting main plot gradually increases, you are dealing with the plot bet. The dangers that arise in the external environment and their importance are also increasing. You'll have to ask the following questions:
What kind of greater harm might my protagonist suffer? Think about the strength of the other side, what obstacles can be introduced next to make the situation worse.
Consider bringing in another character to get him into more trouble.
You can also add a character who may not be against the protagonist, but who must be able to raise everyone's stakes.
Is there any task that is crucial to the protagonist? In what ways could her job be at risk?
* Character bets
What happens in a character's inner world that makes the bet more personal? What makes the protagonist's emotions sway back and forth?
Consider the following question:
How can the situation change to bring more pain to the protagonist's feelings?
What could defeat her and destroy her spiritual pillar?
How does psychological death approach the protagonist?
Is there anyone the protagonist cares about who could get caught up in trouble?
Is there a "ghost" from the past that can appear and bring greater inner torment to the protagonist?
* Social bets
The question you have to ask here is: What are the consequences of this for the wider society?
So, you're going to ask the following question:
How does my protagonist's troubles extend outward to affect larger social groups?
In the storyline, what characters in society can be introduced to illustrate the social stakes?
Ticking clocks
Well-known television screenwriter and novelist Steven Cornell put it this way: "Usually, often early in the story, a clever author places a time lock, a structural device, within a specific time period, a certain event needs to occur, otherwise a certain trouble must appear."
The purpose of this time lock is to compress time and increase the tension of the story. Of course, not all stories will use 'ticking clocks', but writers with flexible means can dig deeper into their potential and find some way and place to integrate something meaningful into the story. ”
1. Establish an important task and then set a time limit for it. This time limit can be as simple as a normal convention, or it can be as scary as a time bomb.
2. "Brainstorm" and come up with some obstacles that prevent the character from easily succeeding within this time frame.
3. In the last possible moment, let this tension relax a bit. Sometimes, the most important ticks happen at the climax, but don't overlook the lesser time pressures in the rest of the story.
* Interrupt
A simple interruption can also create suspense. Remember, suspense means not giving a solution.
* Minor characters
Never waste minor characters. They can play many roles in the novel, enhancing the excitement of the story, adding extra beats, and easing the atmosphere through humor and funny. Finally, they can also add suspense.
A minor character can and should be one of two: either a character who specializes in tripping down to thwart the protagonist, or a good partner of the protagonist.
That is, he either leaves the protagonist frustrated or helps the protagonist. Even if he is a good partner of the protagonist, you can create some suspense according to local conditions.
* Twists and turns
Twists and turns are subsystems of conflict and suspense. By definition, they divert the content of the writing out of the normal predictable range.
They work on the premise of increasing the complexity of the story, increasing the tension, and then helping us complete our number one task: getting the reader to continue reading down.
We all know that there are such suffocating surprises in novels or movies. For authors of novels of all types, creating such moments is a pleasure.
* Ability to take off
Another way to increase suspense is to remove the protagonist's ability to do something basic. For example, the protagonist can't walk anymore. Let's say he saw a murder.
Can you let the characters have a functional problem before or during the story? Or, can you take away one of the equipment or helpers that the protagonist needs to solve the problem?
* Increase the strength of the opposing side
As the story progresses, you can also give your opponents more power. Like what:
Opponents have allies rushing to support;
Opponents get more or better weapons;
The opponent discovers a secret that the protagonist does not want to reveal;
The opponent takes a person the protagonist likes as a hostage;
The opponent obtains the personal information of the protagonist.
Considering the plot from the perspective of his opponent, what strategy will he come up with to win? Make a table as if the commander were planning a campaign, using them as an alternative to the scene.
* Emotions and Thoughts
Don't ignore the inner activities of the characters when creating suspense. Here's why: The inner thoughts of the characters delay the resolution of the problem. This is a tool to increase tension.
Now, you've got a toolbox crammed with tools for you to create suspense on every level that pushes the reader on.
When you look at your manuscript and feel a little procrastinating (you don't want to slow down), consider the strategies in the toolbox. There is always one that works for your situation.