Element 7: How to Use Suspense (page 21)
This is a tricky one. Folks often think that suspense means car chases, psychological thrillers, horror films. Yet, in any good work of fiction, suspense is the single idea that grabs your attention and keeps you holding on throughout the 10 pages of a short story or the 900 of a long novel.
Read the following quotes from four literary works. Rank them in order of which feels most suspenseful and explain why.
| “Besides the neutral expression that she wore when she was alone, Mrs. Freeman had two others, forward and reverse, that she used for all her human dealings.” ~ Flannery O’Connor Good Country People | “Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband’s death.” ~ Kate Chopin The Story of an Hour |
| “Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.” ~ Gabriel Garcia Marquez 100 Years of Solitude | “If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me…” ~ J.D. Salinger Catcher in the Rye |
How each opening line works in its respective story to introduce suspense.
1. O’Connor’s first line introduces us to one of the characters of this short story and the hint is subtle. Notice that it does create some immediate intrigue about Mrs. Freeman. We wonder about her peculiar expressions, “forward and reverse,” and what we’re to discover about her “human dealings.” Upon reading the story, we discover that this final phrasing foreshadows the theme of the story. It is quite deft writing on the part of O’Connor.
2. The opening line of this flash fiction short story introduces us to our main character, Mrs. Mallard, and gives us two significant pieces of suggestive info — she has heart trouble and she’s about to learn of her husband’s death. We’ve arrived just in time!
3. This is the start of a long novel and includes the hint. This hint comes from the stark contrast between something shocking and presumably criminal (facing a firing squad) and something simplistic and innocent (the memory of discovering ice with his father). We are curious about why Colonel Buendia is in his current predicament, especially when it seems he had a normal childhood with a loving father. The opening phrase, Many years later, lets us know that we’ll be rewarded for our curiosity because Marquez indicates we’ll cover some breadth of Buendia’s life.
4. What Salinger so uniquely hints at is not only the story of Holden’s life, but also of Holden’s personality, his character. His voice is so distinctive, anyone familiar with the book can recognize it even out of context. And this distinction intrigues us, as does such a frank description of his childhood. We’re curious where he is now so want to stick around to find out. And this is the purpose of all hints, to keep the reader engaged. Note that the point of view here uses first-person and eliminates the fourth wall by having Holden speak directly to us. It shows Salinger’s mastery of the craft.
Element 8: How to Manipulate Your Readers’ Emotions
(page 26)
This is a fun one. The first six elements focus on putting your readers in the room with your characters and letting them get to know these folks who’ve been roaming the rooms of your mind. The Emotion element is not about how the characters are feeling — that comes from your vivid sensory development (see Chapter 5). The Emotion element is about manipulating your readers’ feelings and we do this through pacing.
Take a look at the following two sets of sentences, below, from the flash fiction story, Cucumber Field by Esteban Martinez (found in Appendix A). You’ll notice that the two blocks of text are about the same size, yet the sentence number differs, as does the way they’re broken up by commas. Different pacing compels a different emotional response from the reader.
Martinez understands that for the reader to feel calm and expectant at the beginning, he must manipulate the pacing with long, controlled statements. And for the reader’s emotions to mirror the protagonist, Joaquin’s, at the end of the story, the pacing must quicken and this happens with shorter, choppier sentences. Your pacing must match the emotion you wish to evoke from your reader.
Here are the first three sentences from the story:
“Joaquin pats the pockets of his faded denim cover-alls causing small exhalations of dust. The red-dirt fingers of his left hand stop at his right breast pocket. His hands look as though they belong to an old man, wrinkled and hard, but his face shows only sixteen, maybe eighteen years.”
These opening statements set the stage for the story. They introduce us to the character and do so in a way that we feel present on the scene — we can see, hear and feel Joaquin’s movements. We don’t feel any worry or alarm. We’re content just to be introduced as he seems content and unhurried. Notice the phrasing of each sentence is long and controlled. (And the final sentence sets up the suspense with its contrasting imagery.)
Now consider the final statements:
“Joaquin’s hands shoot into and disappear in the cucumber patch. They reappear, each hand gripping several cucumbers, each hand gliding toward the bucket. He releases the cucumbers. They hit the bottom of the bucket and thud. His hands shoot into the patch again, glide to the bucket, release the fruit.”
These sentences are about the same length as the first, but the phrasing is short. The breaks in imagery, set off by the commas, make us rush through the reading, starting and stopping, creating a breathless feeling. And not only does the pacing cause this breathless feeling but also the imagery and use of repetitive phrases such as hands shoot and each hand. Words like gripping and thud help us to see and hear Joaquin (keeping us present) and the words’ connotation (the emotion they evoke) is foreboding.