The key to suspense

Mol­ly, a sev­enth grad­er from San­té Fe, New Mex­i­co, asks, “I want to write sus­pense­ful books. How do you make them that way?” 

Mol­ly, there are many ways to answer this ques­tion. First, your plot has to have an aura of poten­tial dis­as­ter, dan­ger, or threat. While there is noth­ing wrong with mak­ing that dan­ger con­crete, far bet­ter to make it a bit vague. That will engage your read­er to use his or her own imag­i­na­tion to height­en a sense of dan­ger, of menace. 

Sec­ond­ly, you have to make your read­er care about your char­ac­ters, and absolute­ly embrace your main char­ac­ter. You want to write in such a way that the read­er wants to pro­tect that char­ac­ter, as in, “No, no, don’t go through that door!” But you want to do it with­out say­ing those words. 

Third: You need to struc­ture your sto­ry in such a fash­ion that the read­er is com­pelled to go on. Here, chap­ter breaks are a vital tool. Don’t end them by writ­ing, “What was lurk­ing behind the door?” Cre­ate action that has the read­er ask that ques­tion. If you want to cre­ate a cliff hang­ing break, you first have to cre­ate a cliff. 

Fourth: What aca­d­e­mics call fore­shad­ow­ing—I call it sub­tly inform­ing your reader—is vital, because it allows the read­er to antic­i­pate risks—even if they don’t happen. 

Fifth: Selec­tive choice of words is cru­cial. Don’t fill your text with …”Sud­den­ly, a …” Or, “to her great shock …” If a char­ac­ter is “ter­ri­fied,” use that word once. Bet­ter yet, have the char­ac­ter act in a ter­ri­fied manner. 

Over all, I think the key to sus­pense is mak­ing your read­er a part­ner in the sto­ry, get­ting him/her to per­ceive poten­tial mis­ad­ven­tures. Think of it this way: Your pri­ma­ry task is to fill your reader’s mind with the antic­i­pa­tion of alarm­ing pos­si­bil­i­ties. If you do not do that, you will ….