Skip to main content

Writing Interesting Valleys in Between Peaks

This article that I wrote originally appeared on Suite101.

Writing Interesting Valleys in Between Peaks

Keep the Reader Intrigued Even If Conflict Has Ebbed

In lulls in the novel, narrow the scene’s focus or change things up to keep the reading pace strong.

Stories are a series of peaks and valleys, high tension scenes and low tension scenes, also known as Scenes and Sequels. You must have those lulls in order to give the reader a chance to catch his breath, and also to set up the next scene.

However, while you must have these low tension scenes, make sure they don’t put your reader to sleep.

Use Words and Phrases to Pace the Sequel

In general, higher tension scenes have shorter sentences and a choppier reading flow to encourage a faster reading pace, so for lower tension scenes, use longer sentences and more flowing grammatical structure.

Obviously, don’t go to extremes. Use your own better judgment in this. However, this can be a valuable tool to clearly indicate to the reader that the tension has ebbed and there’s a breathing space here.

Focus On the Character’s Decision For the Next Scene

Let the character go through all the steps she needs to in order to make a decision about what to do next. Draw the reader into this searching process to give her a stake in what’s happening.

This is also a great way to show off the uniqueness your character, if you have her react in an original way to the conflict of the previous scene. It can give your reader insight and sympathy into who this character is, the demons she has to face.

End the scene with the character’s decision for the next scene, which provides a good segueway and keeps the story moving.

Feel Free to Telescope Time

This is a good place to allow longer periods of time to pass. You don’t want the Sequel itself to take too long or else you’ll bore your reader, but this is a good place to allow a few days, weeks, or even months to pass by, skipping the boring stuff but giving the reader a glimpse into the character’s actions, feelings, and thoughts during that time.

Bring Up Subplots

A lower tension scene is also a great place to introduce new information or minor plotlines to the story. You can use these subplots and the character’s reaction to them to reveal personality and morals.

This will enable your reader to delve deeper into the life of your character without a boring narrative treatise on their favorite color, favorite ice cream flavor, and the details of their childhood.

Use a Sequel to Change Viewpoints

Changing viewpoints automatically reduces tension, so you can keep the story moving quickly and still create a valley for the reader to catch his breath.

When you change viewpoint, the reader has to adjust to a new character and situation, which takes time and space. The reading flow slows. Tension drops.

The great thing is that the story itself doesn’t have to slow, but the tension will automatically decrease. For high octane stories, this is a good way to give the reader a breather without slowing down the action itself.

Use Your Own Judgment

Do you need a valley for every peak? No. Do you need a short valley versus a long one? No.

It’s your story. Use your own judgment and gut instinct about it.

The general guideline is to have a valley for every peak, but if you don’t want to do it, then don’t. You have the prerogative because you’re the author.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Writing Fight Scenes

I love martial arts movies and action flicks. So naturally I'd write action scenes. I discovered that it takes a slightly different writing style. These are some of the things I learned, although this list isn't exhaustive by any means. Action-Reaction A fight scene is always Action-Reaction. He punches, she staggers back. She kicks, he blocks and swings a fist at her. Watch out for putting your reaction before your action: She staggered back when he slammed his fist into her shoulder. The rule of thumb is to have each action-reaction have its own paragraph, although that’s not always possible. Sometimes the sentences are too short for their own paragraphs and can be combined. It’s up to the writer how to format it: He swung a roundhouse punch. She bent backward and felt his knuckles swish past her nose. versus: He swung a roundhouse punch. She bent backward and felt his knuckles swish past her nose. Short sentences = fast reading flow Use short sentences and phrases to make re...

The 50-word elevator pitch

The 50-word elevator pitch: Basic story elements and a two-sentence novel summary Writing a 50-word summary is good to help you condense your thoughts and themes for your novel. This summary can be used when you pitch to editors or agents, and it can also be used in a query letter to an editor or agent. Swain gives this excellent method to come up with a 2-sentence (or 50-word) summary of your novel. This can be done before you write it or afterward, whichever works best for your writing style. This is similar to steps 1 and 2 of Randy Ingermanson's Snowflake method : https://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/articles/snowflake-method/ Each novel typically has five basic story elements: Character --Your protagonist or focal character. You can sometimes have two protagonists, but even then, often the story of one character is slightly more dominant than the other. Situation --The troubling situation your character is stuck in that forces him to act. Objective --What y...

How to write a kiss

There was a question on the writer’s Discord server that I’m on where someone asked how to write a kiss. They weren’t specifically asking me, but I was able to give a short answer for how I write kisses. I write and read traditional romances, so my kiss scenes tend to be heavily influenced by the genre and by how my editors critiqued my manuscripts. You basically want to focus on the emotion of the kiss and how the kiss makes the point of view character feel, as opposed to going deep into physical detail. Ideally, the description will show that the kiss is something special and not just them macking. For example the kiss made her feel ___. Or the kiss was ___ which made it seem that he felt ___ for her. “The kiss made her feel as if she were incredibly precious to him.” “His lips were gentle and almost tentative, as if he were afraid of frightening her.” “The kiss surprised her and yet felt as familiar as if they’d kissed a thousand times before. The kiss felt like home.” I...