Writing Good Tension
Good afternoon all,
I know this was supposed to be live yesterday, I promise I have very good reason for not posting it. So I’ve been feeling lousy because of the weather, I started to bounce back from that this week, but I decided to delve into my editing one last time to finish this draft. I realized it was no longer feasible to finish this draft before the due date, but I finished it on time. I just edited the last chapter this morning.
So that was more important to me at the time. I didn’t want to be behind the deadline I gave myself. Especially not after the whirlwind that has been the last month editing this book. I had taken so many days off than I can originally wanted, but things happened I wasn’t expecting. But I still finished on time. But that’s why I decided to focus on that instead of doing a blog post. I knew I’d be doing it today instead because I wanted to do both. Evidently, one was more important to me than the other.
Without any further delay, let’s get to today’s actual topic.
Creating good tensions needs many things and you can incorporate many others, but there are two main things that good tension needs.
Goal: - your character(s) need a goal. They need to have something they’re chasing after, something motivating them through their lives. They need something they are striving towards. This is the biggest necessity for any good story in general, if your characters don’t want anything, then there’s no point in telling their story. You can’t tell a good story about a person who wants nothing because that’s just bragging which no one likes.
Conflict: - if you have a goal then you need something (literally anything) that keeps the character(s) from achieving the goal or gets in the way of this goal. This could be something that prevents them/stops them/holds them back/makes them question their goal. This needs to occur in any good book because it creates tension, especially in the rising action and climax of the story. It’s what the entire story is about, how the character fights against the conflict to achieve their goal. And in the climax, they do just that.
These two components are essential for good tension in a story. They fight against each other and that creates the tension we talk about. It’s the battle between the goal and the conflict. Between trying to reach the goal and what prevents the goal from being reached.
You can’t have tension without the clash of these two elements. Now, the stronger they clash is how you adjust how much tension there is. This is helpful as you’re building to the climax, you make them clash harder due to a character falling short of their goal before you reach the inevitable climax when the character succeeds. This is what adds anxiety about what's going to happen with and to your characters, by the reader. This keeps readers engaged, excited, and turning pages.
Tension is very important for good stories as it is the driving force of a reader’s desire to keep reading your novel. This is the driving force keeping your readers interested and immersed in the story taking place.
Thank you so much for stopping by and for being patient with me! I hope this helps anyone who is maybe struggling with what I used to struggle with, how all the pieces of writing fit together, what they mean and what they do. Happy reading and writing! Until next time.
Celine Rose Marie
