The Art of the Tease*
How writers keep readers wanting more
Yesterday’s prompt focused on hooking a reader by beginning with an implied question. Below are a few of the sentences students created.
- “Months passed before I knew the whole story, and even then I did not regret what I did.” — Amanda Lowe
- “There was no way out. As the crack of the thunder boomed, everyone dropped. The last sound I heard was of singing children.” — Megan DelSignore
- “She wanted to know if Nate was still alive, but she just didn’t have the guts to go back into the woods.” — Johnny Rodriguez
- “I opened the door expecting to hear the loud voices of my family, but the only sound that prevailed was a deafening cry for help.” — Katie Doherty
These writers learned quickly how to grab their readers’ attention in a single sentence. But now, how will they keep their catch?
Writers hold readers’ attention by feeding them one little satisfying answer at a time, building more questions as they go, and withholding most of the story’s mysterious morsels until later — sometimes much later. This takes patience and — admit it — a taste for cruelty.
To practice the art of withholding secrets, imagine a narrator who has just gone through an astounding experience. Perhaps this character just burnt down the family home. Or maybe she just walked away from a plane crash. Maybe the character has slipped into a deep crevasse while hiking up a snowy mountain. Or maybe the character has just locked her boyfriend into the cellar of an old house. The possibilities are endless. But here’s the twist — the narrator is beginning to tell the reader about what has just occurred, but the narrator’s attitude does not quite fit what a reader would expect from someone telling this story.
For example, imagine that your narrator just walked into a house to find his mother has hanged herself. He begins by saying that he wished his mother hadn’t chosen to wear her blue dress. Something is wrong with the narrator, but we don’t know what, and that question will keep us reading. Or maybe your narrator fell into a crevasse, but rather than showing the character in a state of panic, the narrator opens by saying, “She wouldn’t be home to feed the dogs. That was clear, and it would be hours before they started barking loud enough for the neighbors to call the police.” Why is the narrator responding to his/her situation so strangely? That’s the implied question that will hook a reader.
Don’t you dare answer this question right away. Instead, let the narrator feed your reader one clue at a time, slowly. This is the art of withholding, of torturing your reader by keeping back first one secret and then another. It’s what keeps readers wanting more.
Come to class with at least one page written using a narrator whose tone, at least at the start, does not match your character’s situation. Write the one-page start of this story in Google docs or Medium and tweet us your link. (Don’t forget to include a picture!) Be sure to set your Google “share” setting so that anyone with the link can open your document.
Remember, let your story unfold slowly. Don’t give up your secrets easily!
*A special thanks to creative writing student, Violet Bethke, who gave me the idea for this prompt!
