Writing Great Suspense
Like most people between the ages of 18 and 36, you're probably writing a suspense novel. Perhaps you’ve written your first book, and realize that it doesn’t have any suspense in it at all. Maybe you’ve written a suspense novel, but it’s the wrong sort of suspense. The details are irrelevant—what matters is that you are awful at writing truly great suspense, and it infuriates you.
With my program, you'll learn how to inject those blood-curdling hooks into every nook and crevice of your writing. You’ll discover how to construct suspense-packed sentences, and how to “end” those sentences with edge-of-your-seat punctuation.
Onto the first lesson!
Lesson 1: General Suspense Tips
The opening sentence is essential to a great suspense novel, as it lets the reader know what the story’s going to be about. I’ve included a sample opening sentence below, to show you how it’s done right:
John crossed over to the living room and lit a cigarette.
Note how I have successfully introduced a character, a location, and an action. Now let’s crank up the suspense:
John crossed over to the living room and lit a cigarette.
Or did he?
Doubt sets in. Our reader begins to question everything he or she has come to believe. Who is this John character? Can we really trust him? How can really trust anybody?
Chilling questions. Luckily you don’t have to answer them. Remember: Great suspense lies in what you don't tell your readers.
Having placed the seed of doubt in our reader, we quickly move onto something else, distracting the hell out of them.
John then went to work and nothing happened.
This is a perfectly acceptable follow-up sentence, right? Wrong. This sentence isn’t suspenseful at all. Let’s try that follow-up sentence again:
John then went to work and nothing happened. John went to work. His day was a roller-coaster ride of intrigue and mystery.
Did you see what made the 'right' sentence suspenseful and what made the 'wrong' sentence utterly worthless? If not, you might be making the same mistakes and not even realizing it.
TIP: Try practicing writing in a mirror. Watch yourself as you write. What are you doing wrong?
Lesson 2: Writing The First Chapter
Read the following opening paragraph and try to find where the suspense is coming from:
The gunman adjusted his gay hat as he powled the misty ooftops, knowing his pey would show soon. Sweat stuck to his shit as he contemplated what he must do. The one-eyed man who had killed his fathe would finally pay the pipe.
An excellent opening to a great suspense novel. Where are all the R’s? Is it a typographical error? Does the writer simply not like R’s? Or are there mysterious deeds at play, and are the R’s somehow involved? All of these questions spiral through a reader's mind as they find themselves in the taut grip of suspense.
In the next paragraph, we release this grip:
The one-eyed man had stolen all the 'r's.
Goosebumps, yes? If you felt a cathartic release while reading that sentence, you’re not alone. Why? Because that was great suspense.
A simple lesson can be gleaned from this: a suspense novel should start with a very suspenseful opening paragraph, then release the suspense in the second. After this you just write the rest of your book. The reader knows what kind of powerhouse suspense writing to expect, and your work is done.
TIP: Lightning is so suspenseful it’s not even funny, so always use it for everything. Lightning makes the reader notice whatever happened before the lightning, so also remember to put in a lot of suspense before the lightning crashes. Just pack it in there, no one will mind.
Lesson 3: Writing Suspenseful Dialogue
Read the following dialogue and watch for the “end parts” of the sentences. These are the parts of the sentences where you're probably going to able to fit most of the old suspense in.
"I never thought you'd be capable of murder," said Janet, crossing to the living room to light a cigarette. Or did she? "I've known you since the first grade. You've never harmed a fly."
"Maybe that's true," said John. "Maybe it's not true. Maybe I've harmed lots of flies." He looked over at Janet, who may or may not have been lighting a cigarette. "You don't know me, Janet."
"Or do I? I know you're not capable of murder, John. Sure, maybe flies. I’ll give you that. But people? That’s stupid."
Janet put the lighter she may or may not have been using to light a cigarette on the table. Then Janet saw an enormous bloody knife on the table.
"Is this knife yours, John?" she asked.
"No,” John replied. “I'm pretty sure it's not mine."
"Are you lying to me, John?"
"No, probably not."
Lightning crashed!
Egad! Is John a murderer? Possibly! That's the thing—who knows? Good suspense dialogue should crackle off the page for your reader, as the preceding dialogue just did for you. Always keep the reader on their toes by being ambiguous about everything. Leave out important details, locations, names, even events integral to the plot.
Remember, the more the reader has to guess at, the more suspenseful your novel becomes.
Lesson 4: Ending Your Suspense Novel
A good suspense novel must have a surprise twist ending to leave the reader completely dumbfounded. If you've done your job well up to this point, then the reader should have no clue what's happening, who your characters are, or what it is they're so worried about. Time for the final turn of the screw to make them jump out of their seats!
Observe:
John and Janet had finally solved the murder. It had been some other guy all along. They were just sitting down to a delicious lasagna that Janet had baked when suddenly—
How would YOU end the tale? Write out your ending now. Then read my ending to see why yours is wrong.
GOOD:
—Janet's head exploded! Janet had been injected with a toxin that explodes heads. John stopped eating his lasagna.
Or did he?
The End
BETTER:
—a big bomb dropped on the house, killing both of them, but mostly Janet. The bomb had been launched in Iraq because of a war there, but the guidance system had shorted out, so it went over to Janet's place instead and flew right into her head. John had a mouthful of lasagna at time and was flabbergasted.
Everyone else was flabbergasted too. "We never saw that coming," they said.
It turned out that John's last name was Saunders. Nobody had ever known that.
The End
SUSPENSETASTIC:
—a murderer walked in the house!
"Oh no, a murderer!" John said as he stopped eating his lasagna. The murderer chased John all through the house and murdered him while Janet escaped. She ran outside and flagged down a policeman who was driving by.
"There's a murderer in my house!" Janet said.
"He's not in your house," said the policeman. "He's ME!" Holy shit! The policeman was the murderer! He murdered Janet.
The End
Parting Thoughts
Alfred Hitchcock once wrote: "It's either great suspense, or it's a large pile of my stool." These words are as true today as they were two hundred years ago, when he first made suspenseful films.
No, dear readers—great suspense writing is not easy. But with a lot of practice and determination, you will, I assure you, never be as good as I am. You will, however, still be among the great suspense writers of the 20th Century.
Dear readers, I leave you to it. Also: lightning crashed suddenly!
Sorry to scare you like that.
