tension

Hey all, I'm working on a dark fantasy horror novel, and I've hit a structural problem I'm curious how others handle. My opening chapters are deliberately quiet. My main character is tracking someone through a rainy river town: talking to a crooked toll clerk, reading ledgers, buying drinks for...

I want one of my scenes, a tet-a-tet between two characters, in which there is a huge power imbalance (one of them is a literal god), to feel as tense as possible. There should be a constant threat, a feeling that at any moment the conversation could turn sideways and the God could obliterate...

I've been thinking a lot about stakes recently, and how to make them more interesting. It sometimes feels like every fantasy story I read has the exact same stakes. Usually, the protagonist's life is at risk, as well as someone they care about. What I've noticed, though, is that while those...