Tension Comes in Many Forms
Tension is one of
the best means to hold a reader’s attention and keep them from putting your
book down. It is also a feeling that isn’t always clearly defined. If you ask
for an example of what adds tension to a story, the first response you often
hear is actually an action scene. The problem with that answer is: action isn’t
necessarily tension. The car chase through Paris in the movie “Ronin,” is
fantastic action. However, the movie’s tension isn’t the high speed pursuit and
crash at the end, but comes from the conflict within the group of mercenaries
gathered together to obtain a valuable suitcase. Some are trustworthy, others
are not. The viewer is on the edge of their seat throughout the movie,
wondering if Jean Reno, or Robert De Niro, or Stellan Skarsgard is a traitor.
In any genre there
are different ways to inject the story with tension. I write romances so I am
going to use a scene from my story Golden
Chariot. Charlotte Dashiell, my heroine, believes that the characters from The Iliad, by Homer, may not have been
fictional but real. She engages in a heated discussion with Atakan Vadim, the
hero. For every point she makes, he presents a challenging counterpoint. I will
paraphrase the dialogue form the scene.
Charlotte said, “The story of Troy and the
war was retold through the centuries. I’m saying it wasn’t a mere war story. It
had to be more.”
“No. The bones of the story were given to
him (Homer)...a tale which happened to include a few accurate details. Like
many bards, he filled it with people from his imagination.”
“Something made the story unique. I say it’s
the people.”
“He took bits of old tales, injects the
legends with heroes and villains for entertainment purposes. Why do you dispute
the logical?”
This is a small
section of the scene’s dialogue. Atakan’s disbelief, his doubt and the fact he
forces her to defend her beliefs is a source of tension between them.
Combining tension
with action can be especially fun to write. As authors we can vicariously live
experience with our characters. In the following, Charlotte, who’s a nautical
archaeologist and part of a shipwreck recovery team, is out swimming in the sea
near the team’s campsite. Unbeknownst to her, there’s been an undersea
earthquake, which has triggered dangerous riptides. What was a relaxing swim
becomes deadly dangerous for her.
Here’s an excerpt:
Like all the team, she was a strong swimmer
and tried to power through the swells and turn back. Fighting the tide, she
wasn’t making any progress. The current was sweeping her the opposite direction
and toward the open water. She kicked harder as the waves surged over her head, pushing against her strokes, the
salt irritating her eyes. The bigger rollers kicked her ass. They were followed
by rapid, much smaller rollers. Those piddling whitecaps were kicking her ass
worse. Every time she opened her mouth to take a gulp of air after the first
set, the second-string whitecaps smacked her in the face, sending more seawater
into her lungs than air.
She caught glimpses of the increasingly
distant beach. If she screamed for help no one would hear.
With some scenes,
worry and fear for our characters evolves and grows like a layer cake of
tension. In Journey in Time, my
time-travel romance, the hero, Alex, and heroine, Shakira, find themselves in
medieval England. Shakira wakes to find the Alex has left to go hunting with
the prince. In his absence, the king orders her to stay with a wool merchant
for a few days. We, the reader, know outside the palace walls she is without
protection. We worry for her. The king informs heroine the merchant is a
favorite of the queen. More worry, if a situation arises, she must consider the
queen will believe the merchant over her. The king alleges Alex knows of
arrangement but the reader and Shakira know he doesn’t. The king can tell him
any story he wants when Alex asks where she has gone. Our worry turns to fear
for her. As merchant and Shakira ride to his home and further from the palace, she
begins memorizing landmarks in case she must flee. Fear turns to tension the
closer she gets to the merchant’s house. What is the king’s intention? What
kind of man is the merchant? If she has to run, she has no means to defend herself,
no money, and no guarantee she can gain entry back into the palace. Her tension
becomes the reader’s.
Tension doesn’t
always have to be big. We can connect with readers by giving our characters
moments of tension that we all experience in our daily lives. For example: In
your story, your protagonist absolutely must make a particular flight. But as
writers, we are compelled to make things difficult. We torment him in all kinds
of ways: He can’t find his car keys. The drawbridge he must cross to get to the
airport is up and what seems to be the slowest boat in the world is passing
through. He misses the shuttle bus at the long term parking by seconds. The TSA
officer chooses the protagonist to pull out of line to perform a thorough and
lengthy search of him. Haven’t we all had days like this?
In conclusion, I’d
suggest look for a way to ramp up the tension in every scene, whether in a
small or big way. There’s a little of us in most of our characters, even the
villains. It’s only fair they share in our fears, frustrations, and worries.
