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Fiction Writing | Writing Tips | Creative Writing Workshop
Wait for It…
Setting up the inevitable. Creative Writing Workshop, session 5
This piece forms part of a Creative Writing Workshop here at the Fiction Writer’s Den. See this piece for an introduction. You can find all of the writing workshop articles in this list, and check out a list of responses here.
Have you ever watched a small child carrying an over-full drink, just waiting for them to stumble and spill it?
Or have you sat down to a meal with two disagreeable people, knowing that it’s only a matter of time that an argument (or worse) flares up…?
To the creative writer, those moments where you are just waiting for something to go disastrously wrong are great for your stories.
A Raymond Carver quote that I shared in a previous article captures this well:
“There has to be tension, a sense that something is imminent.” (source)
Examples
Here are a few examples of story elements that bring this sense of imminence or inevitability:
- A character coughs. Often, in fiction, this is a sign that they are going to get ill or die, and the reader/viewer is just waiting for…
