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Tension and Conflict Part 7 - Stretching Tension

   Welcome to CAN Blog where we share information with you on new books, writing tips, and much more. Hello from Gail Gaymer Martin @ www.gailgaymermartin.com 

For the past seven posts, I've cover the topic of Tension and Conflict. This is a major part of writing fiction since it is emotion that captures the reader and keeps them hanging on to the pages even when dinner time rolls around.

We all want readers to love our work and good conflict triggers tension which is shown through emotion. Today the topic is Stretching Tension, and it will provide you with numerous ideas to enhance the emotion in your stories.

You know how a rubber band works. You can pull it very taut so it will snap across a room if you let

it go, or you can pull it only to stretch around an item. Tension in fiction is similar. It can be so taut the reader can’t stop reading, or it can be only tight enough to hold the plot together so it doesn’t fall apart. All types of tension are needed. Not every scene should be edge of the seat tension. Some scenes can only leave the reader asking questions or the character struggling with a dilemma.

Learning techniques that add various kinds of tension to your novel will help you keep the stress level high. Here are a few that you can use. 

Accelerate and Decelerate Details
Think about an old John Wayne Western. The bad guy faces John Wayne. Each stands waiting for the first one to draw his weapon. The camera pans in on John Wayne’s hand posed close to his holster. The camera swings to the bad guy with a closeup of his evil eyes. The camera moves to John Wayne’s boot as it shifts a half inch, then to the muscle in his jaw that is jerking with tension. Back to the bad guy, his fingers twitching.

You get the point. To create tension provide second by second details showing the growing danger or growing action. Two guns snatched from the holster followed by gun shots shows conflict but lacks the power of the tension as the viewer watches the danger build.

This same technique can be used in a family saga as we watch the mourning widow touch her dead husband’s pipe, lift his sweater and buries her nose in it. We feel the emotion. It happens in a romance as we watch the camera move to the hero’s eyes, his fingers twitching to run his hand through the hero’s hair. Though it is more difficult to capture some of the emotion through writing rather than seeing it on the screen, you can bring these emotions to life by delving in the sight images as well as the introspection of the POV character.

Interrupted Action
Use various disruptions to stop a conversation or action. The serial killer hiding behind the drape is drawn back to hide when the light turns on and a group of people enter the room. The hero leans forward planning to kiss the heroine when the telephone or doorbell rings. Two people sharing confidential information halt when a third party enters a room. This kind of interruption can also delay the action totally. The killer slips back out the window, realizing this isn’t the right time to strangle the woman. The hero has lost the moment to kiss the heroine, and the conversation may have to wait for a more opportune time. These delays add to the tension of the reader and the characters.

Distraction
In the same way interrupted action causes stress, a lesser technique can be used to give the characters time to pause and to even rethink what they are about to do or say. Use car headlights flashing on the wall. Someone might be passing or even pulling into the driveway. A barking dog can be a good distraction. It fuzzes the mind of the person talking or it makes them wonder what’s going on outside. Again could someone be coming. No matter why the dog is barking, it stops the action for a moment and in the process adds a small slice of tension.

Cliffhangers
When writing novels with multiple POVs, a great tension creating technique is to stop the scene at a place that leaves the reader hanging. The heroine hears the doorbell and opens the door. She grabs her heart and screams. Scene ends. The hero is driving along the highway, a truck swings into his lane, brakes squeal. The hero yells and veers his car to the left. Scene ends.

When you read thrillers and suspense novels, notice how chapters tend to end in this fashion. This is why it’s a thriller. But you can use this in other genres also, by cutting the scene following one character asking another a very pointed question that will make a plot difference. When she asks, have his jaw clamp and blood drain from his face. Scene ends.

Short Scenes or Chapters
In the same way as a cliffhanger, use shorter scenes that leave questions unanswered and then move on to a new scene with another POV character. This pulls the reader along anxious to find out what is happening in the previous scene.

One Step Forward, One Step Back
To add tension to your stories, allow your characters to make mistakes and misjudge situations. A husband sees his wife at lunch with a strange man. He draws the wrong conclusion. In suspense provide clues that lead to dead ends. When a criminal is about to be apprehended, turn the action around. Allow him to get away or to be proven innocent. This kind of tension is excellent in thrillers, mysteries or suspense novels. In all genre, try to develop plot situations that aren’t always perfect. Say no instead of yes. Bring on rain rather than sunshine. Miss the ride to an important appointment. Lose a phone number that is vital to the story’s plot. These conflicts add excitement and tension.

Word Choice and Sentence Structure
Words and sentence length contribute to the overall feel of a novel. Shorter sentences help create tension and thus provides a feel of action to the story’s pace. Longer sentences work in romance, some women’s fiction and literary novels because it provides a more lilting rhythm to the sentences. Keep this in mind when developing more tense scenes.

Word choice is affected by the sounds a word makes. In the English language we have alphabet sounds that are hard and some are softer. The hard sounds are p, t, b, g, k, c, d, q, and s while the softer sounds are found in m, n, l, w, f, h & in vowels. To create tension, use the hard sounds. “Shut up, and keep quiet.” He toppled the table to the floor as he trapped the woman in a death grip. In a romance, use the softer sounds. He wrapped his arm around her and eased her to him, mesmerized by her luscious lips longing to be kissed. Notice the use of softer sounds, the m, l and vowels. Keep this technique in mind when creating tension in your novels. It’s one more way to create emotion.

These techniques are among others that help to create tenson which is shown in emtion. I’m sure you will think of more. If you do, please add them to the comments for others to read as well. Until next time, blessings as you write. 

Jump-Starting Your Creativity

Hi, Dave Fessenden here for a discussion on creativity and idea implementation.

There’s an old story that a beginning writer once asked a veteran author how he kept coming up with writing ideas. The veteran grabbed the young man by the shoulders, shook him fervently, and said with a tone of desperation, “How do you stop coming up with ideas?!”

Are You Stuck? Be Counterintuitive!

Hi, Dave Fessenden here to talk to you writers out there for this Friday’s blog. One of the most painful experiences a writer can have is the feeling that your writing instincts have betrayed you. You encounter a writing problem, such as a nonfiction concept that seems to defy explanation, or a fictional character that is hard to describe. All your standard, tried-and-true writing techniques seem to fall flat, leaving you frustrated.

While it often helps to set this kind of problem aside for a few days, if you are on a deadline you may not have that luxury. Even worse is when you have set it aside, and still cannot make it work. At that point it is probably time to be counterintuitive.

WRITERS WHO SPEAK - QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

After an unusually cool spring and month of June, our typical Texas summer has come in with the fireworks of the 4th of July this past week. But those of us who have grown up in Texas, are used to it, and we get through it every year. Some may feel like the fireworks fly when it comes to the Q&A time after one has delivered one's talk. Well, I have a confession to make ...

Why Do You Write?

I'll be taking about a year off of my CAN blog and other CAN activities (but will still "lurk" on the message boards and chime in from time to time - and will still keep writing my Beliefnet blog). The reasons for this are several: Because of a new autoimmune disease/condition diagnosis, I'll be starting a rather potent immunosuppressive drug and don't know what the side effects will be; I have a number of longer writing projects that I am eager to complete; and, well, sometimes I know I have to "do" rather than write about doing!

Which leads me to my blog topic. 

In the midst of our hectic schedules and multiple deadlines, it's always a good idea to revisit the "genesis" of it all, and then gauge projects at hand with what your reason for writing needs to yield. In other words, given that you are a writer at heart and have a love of storytelling, and could turn that storytelling ability to any number of different styles and genres, is what you're writing now what you're meant to write? Purposed to write? Gifted to write?

There's no easy answer to this question, and certainly it's individual for each person. But there are some helpful gauges to determine if you are, indeed, on the right track. 

One gauge is your answer to this:  Are the projects you have now enabling you to say what you have to say? Or, is God tapping you on the shoulder and whispering, "Not here, my child. Over there."? 

If you are very reluctant to get to the keyboard, or if you have become a master or mistress of procrastination, scrambling at the nth hour of a deadline, perhaps God is tapping you on the proverbial shoulder, encouraging you to stop, revisit why you write, and find the better path for your writing talents. As with other things involved in finding purpose in our lives, once writing projects mesh with your need to coommunicate specific sentiments, beliefs, or observations, you probably won't feel as much like procrastinating. Rather, you'll have abundant "fire in the belly" to get to work! 

Another good gauge is if the paychecks become more important than the work itself, or your pursuit of the business end of writing becomes so all-consuming that you cut into your actual writing time.

Another gauge: You find yourself pursuing more of the same kinds of projects, rather than stretching your gifts to "make the most of them."  

Throughout our careers, it's wise to take time to pray over our writing lives career focus. And, to take time to listen to God as he informs us with his tap on the shoulder.

Despite the health issues that loom (and they are very serious), I am quite excited about the coming year. Through prayer, a bit of "deck clearing," and renewed determination, I am ever more sure of why I write, and I'm looking forward to putting fingers to the keyboard like never before! I pray that this year ahead is full of inspiration for you, too, and that your reasons for writing propel you to author amazing works of inspiration and faith. I look forward to reading them!

Joy and peace,

Maureen

www.maureenpratt.com

http://blog.beliefnet.com/gooddaysbaddays/

What to Do with a First Draft

Hi, Dave Fessenden here to talk to you writers out there for this Friday’s blog. If you have completed your first draft, let me be the first to say it: Congratulations! Go ahead and celebrate. Bask in the glow of accomplishment. Take the tribe out for a nice dinner.

Are you done celebrating now? Good, because you’ve got a lot of work ahead of you!

Writing for Kids' Magazines by Crystal Bowman

I meet a lot of writers who want to write for children. They come to writers' conferences with high hopes of making a connection with an editor from a publishing house who is looking for children's material. Many of the writers I meet have written good stories. Some are short stories written in rhyme, others are slightly longer stories written in prose. But even though they may be good stories, well written stories, and stories with a strong, age-appropriate message, most of these stories will not be published as books. The hardcover premium picture book is getting harder and harder to publish, and very few houses are actively seeking them. The cost of publishing premium pictures books is high, which makes the selling point high, which makes parents think twice before buying. So what are these writers supposed to do with the gems they have written? Read on.

Happy About Your Endings?

Hello! Maureen Pratt here with my monthly CAN blog about the craft of writing. This month, some thoughts about satisfying, "gotta read this author again" endings.

Whether you're writing fiction or non-fiction, each piece has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Although they are each crucial to telling a good story, it's the ending that gives readers the final feeling, the ultimate impression, of the work as a whole. If your beginning hooked them into starting to read, and if your middle was experty crafted to keep them reading along with your storytelling, then the ending is that wonderful "icing on the cake," and ideally makes them (the readers) want to run out and buy or read your next work.

But endings can be very tricky. They need to be just long enough, just complete enough, and just resonant enough. What do I mean by that?

We've all read books that didn't know how to end. Instead of tying up the story parts into a neat package, some authors simply over write to the detriment of the piece as a whole. How do you know if your ending seems unending? As you reread your work, ask yourself, "Could I cut this second-to-last scene and still have a coherent story?" Or, cut the last scene from your book and see if the ending works with the deletion. Then, cut the next-to-last scene and examine the book again. 

Carefully study your characters' thought arcs - are they thinking in circles, or is their thought (or prayer) process, leading them to a conclusion? Is the story cycling in the same way, with several scenes that could be worked into only one?

Seemingly endless endings often suffer from lack of energy. Ask your editor or the person to whom you give your "final" draft to tell you where the book might have sagged, and where the pace flagged, toward the ending.

The second thing to gauge is whether your ending is complete enough. Does it convey the end of the story, or does it leave the reader wondering, "what happened to the [ ] back in Chapter Two? Or the character with the long monologue in Chapter EIght?" In non-fiction, if the end of the story is unresolved at press time, tell the reader there's more to come, or simply that at press time a conclusion to the story was unavailable/had not yet occurred.  In a news story for print, one of the things that helps me "end it" succinctly is the knowledge that, if the editor runs out of room, he or she should be able to cut the story at any paragraph (lop it off, in other words), and have it still be a whole story.

Third, does your ending resonate with the rest of your piece? Is the story's voice still that of the beginning, or has you - the author - allowed his or her voice to creep in at the end? Is your effort to end with a huge climax so aggressive that the end seems to jump off the page as if it were unrelated to the rest? 

Just as we study the beginnings of classic literature, to see how authors before us began, so, too, is it helpful to study how our favorite authors tie up the loose ends and allow their stories to bid us farewell. 

Finally, if we're writing from our heart, we will feel a twinge (or more) of sadness at finishing up our work in progress. We might loathe to finish, in fact, and this can lead to some of the pitfalls I've tried to address here. 

But when (if?) this happens to you, take a breath. Relax. Type that "30" or "The End." 

You can always begin again.

Blessings for your work and life,

Maureen

www.maureenpratt.com

http://blog.beliefnet.com/gooddaysbaddays/

Tension And Conflict Part I

  Welcome to the CAN Blog on this balmy day in Michigan from Gail Gaymer Martin at www.gailgaymermartin.com  I enjoy sharing information to you on Writing Fiction and today we begin a seven part topic of Conflict and Tension which drives the novel into the hearts of readers. So let's begin with Part I

 

The Set Up to Tension and Conflict

I recently presented a workshop on tension and conflict. The topic offers many steps to writing a good novel. I began this workshop with the basic elements needed to begin a novel because it sets up how conflict begins. Conflict is a concept you know is vital to any story. It is what drives your story and is an event that causes action between the opposition and the main character. Tension, on the other hand, is the character’s reaction to the event. This reaction arouses emotion of the character and the reader. Emotion is a must in any novel.

Proofreading Pointers #33

Hi! I'm Kathy Ide. In addition to being a published author, I’m a full-time professional freelance editor. For CAN, I'm blogging about “PUGS”--Punctuation, Usage, Grammar, and Spelling ... tips for writers based on the most common mistakes I see in the manuscripts I edit. These are excerpts from my new book, Proofreading Secrets of Best-Selling Authors, which reveal how multi-published authors proofread their manuscripts to avoid typos, inconsistencies, inaccuracies, and PUGS errors. (The book is available from Amazon.) If you're interested in working with a freelance editor (or know someone who is), e-mail me through the contact page of my website. Or go to the Christian Editor Connection to get referrals to other established, professional editorial freelancers. If you’re a freelance editor yourself, or think you might be interested in that field, check out The Christian PEN: Proofreaders and Editors Network.