Creative Writing Rule #4: Make ’em wait.
Holding a reader’s attention depends on withholding information. Writers MUST keep secrets that they reveal one at a time, like crumbs on a path, leading the reader to more surprises along the narrative trail. This is true whether you are writing a poem, creating a film, or completing a novel. Watch how, in the short video below, the director withholds one very important piece of information which, when revealed, brings the story to a satisfying and moving ending.
Writers express this rule a dozen different ways. I could have said, “Imply a question in your first sentence and don’t answer it until you’ve raised a couple more,” or more simply, “Raise questions you don’t answer right away.” Or maybe I should have said, “Hook your readers with something they need to figure out.”
I didn’t understand this strategy thoroughly until I read “A Simple Way To Create Suspense,” by Lee Child. Here’s a link to Child’s article in the New York Times: “A Simple Way to Create Suspense.”
Lee says it best: “As novelists, we should ask or imply a question at the beginning of the story, and then we should delay the answer.”
Look at the opening lines below and try to identify the implied question. You might find more than one.
- Although she’d wanted to, Faith was sure she hadn’t actually killed the doctor.
- The storm that night hid the sounds that would have otherwise sent us running. High winds drowned out everything except the first child’s scream.
- Handsome, yes. Sane, no.
If you are sitting in my class right now, post in our Schoology update feed an opening that implies a question or two or three. No question marks allowed. From the openings your classmates post (or from one you create for yourself), pick one and spend the rest the period adding to the story until you have at least a page. As you write, be careful to raise more questions than you answer. As your writing slowly reveals its secrets, keep adding more mysteries to lead your reader forward. Once you have at least a page, post your writing in Medium and add an appropriate picture to the top. Tomorrow, we will start class by looking at some of your prompts together.
You just learned one of the most important keys to writing a good story. Raising questions keeps readers enthralled, pleasantly entrapped, begging for more. It sounds a little wicked, and maybe it is, but readers love it.
