Into the Guts: How to Build Tension in the Stories We Write

The belly comment seemed to be the licking of the envelope statement. There was no more news coming Brendan’s way, and he was left to wonder…

I won’t spoil it for you with what Brendan is wondering. This is a line from a chapter in the book I’m working on — so in case you read it aloud to your kids or your students, I will save the mystery.

But in the last few posts, I wrote about how to write when you don’t feel like it and how to dig in when the way ahead in your story is foggy. (Whether you are a reader or an author, digging is a nuanced practice that only gets better with… practice.)

As I tried to apply my own advice, and I’ve read from other authors I admire, one thing stands out.

The need for escape and mystery — no matter what genre you’re writing.

I’ve read everything from historical fiction (hello, Francine Rivers’ Redeeming Love) to thrillers, which includes much of my editing work, and light biographies (I like to call them comedic satires) that make me laugh (I’m looking at you, Couplehood, by Paul Reiser). No matter what kind of book I’m reading, they all have one thing in common; they build intrigue and keep the reader asking questions, wanting more, discovering along the way.

Even if it’s a children’s nonfiction tale about reptiles (thanks, my daughter’s classmate at school), we don’t finish books without the introduction of this question: What next?

Because it is such a pivotal question to the reader, it needs to always be at the forefront of an author’s mind. I’m not saying it has to add pressure to your writing process (even though it will at times). But it should be the background music to your writing sessions.

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

As the battle between the nutcracker and the Mouse King in “The Nutcracker,” the tension we feel when we write should be a simmering malaise that’s never truly satisfied. That is what spurs us onto the development of the story, the dropping of hints, the planting of seeds, the asking of questions.

Middle-grade author Alex London told me to make sure never to introduce something into the story that I do not plan to revisit. He also said to leave questions in the reader’s mind that you plan to answer later.

I would recommend coming up with a list of questions that you can follow throughout your story. Whether you are writing a play, a novel or a short story — or even a nonfiction book — knowing what you want the reader to uncover will help you stay on track with building your work’s mystery.

The escape aspect of all books is simple; we read because we want to escape. We might read a mystery because we want to add zest to a boring day-in-the-life-of-yours-truly. We could read a biography because we’d like to think about someone else’s life (and not our own) right now. Or a romance might lift our minds off the world around us into a land of syrupy sweet that is far from reality.

Fantasy tales such as “The Nutcracker and the Mouse King” by E.T.A. Hoffmann, coming-of-age stories like E.B. White’s “Charlotte’s Web” and children’s readers by the King of Silly himself, Dr. Seuss, all started out as something quite different than their adaptations let on. (The real story behind Mary Poppins is a good bit different from the Disney movies, too.)

So as we mine our stories for mystery, let’s not be afraid of the unedited versions of the tales we tell. These might not be the glossy versions that sell movies. But they may lead us to questions — tension — we never knew our readers had, and that is what will lead our readers to answers we never knew we could write.