Double Dipping Tension

[Philip Overby]

K.M. Weiland (who you should follow because she has lots of great articles and a book about outlining I also like) posted this today. It highlights how you can ratchet up tension by allowing it to go up, drop slightly, then ratchet it up again. Sounds like a good technique for those that have trouble maintaining tension in their stories.

I hear this brought up a lot here, but how do you handle ratcheting up your tension?

Double Dipping Tension

 

[Michael J. Tobias]

I've used it in a couple of short stories, which happen to be the stories that my readers have generally liked best. I hesitate to fall back on it, though, since I don't want to become predictable. Like a good spice...too much and the meal is ruined, not enough and it's bland. A good club to have in the bag, but you can't putt with it

 

[Ireth]

I've had a similar question in mind for a while now, not about individual scenes but the bigger over-arching plot. The chapters leading up to the climax of WQ are (hopefully) full of tension, but they're all in the A-plot. I see the need to keep the B-plot moving to keep up as well, but the issue there is I'm unsure of whether to leave those scenes as "breather" scenes, or make them as tense as the rest. Should I give more detail here if need be, or make a new thread about this?

 

[Svrtnsse]

Reading this I realize I did something like this fairly recently. I amped up my MCs nervousness about something and tricked him into thinking everything was going to be fine. Then I slammed the mistake down on him. I wasn't really thinking of double-dipping tension or even adding tension at all. It was merely a fun way of scaring the life out of him. It fits really well with what's described in the article though.

My main concern when doing it was that the reader would feel cheated and that the surprise wouldn't make sense. To avoid this I put in a few hints that wouldn't quite make sense to someone who'd paid attention. That way they'd catch on and instead of being caught by the surprise they'd get some tension out of worrying about how my MC would react when they found out.
I'm not sure how well that actually worked out as my beta reader didn't mention it but claimed to have been taken by surprise.

I did a similar thing shortly after - in the next chapter. This time it's just the MC that doesn't know what's up though. The reader ought to be catching on right away what's going on and will be expecting some kind of reveal is coming. Hopefully this will cause another kind of tension.

So there's the first surprise that the reader hopefully doesn't notice which ends with a bang.
Then there's the second surprise which shouldn't be a surprise to the reader and which also ends with a bang.
Then everything's fine and dandy for a bit and then it all goes horribly wrong very quickly.

 

[skip.knox]

>I hear this brought up a lot here, but how do you handle ratcheting up your tension?

With a ratchet, of course. Excellent for breaking windows, breaking heads, and occasionally for tightening or loosening things. Including plots.

Honestly, I don't consciously try to manage tension. I just try to write scenes that make sense for my characters. I mean, I do drop a monster down from the ceiling, does that count? But I do that in order to give the reader a nice, juicy close-up so I don't have to take time to do detailed description when I get to the final battle. Its arrival also lets a couple of characters pull out the stops (dueling organs?) with their magic powers. Any tension induced thereby is entirely coincidental.

I don't mean to be coy by saying that. I have the monster arrive because the characters are in the monster's lair and one of the characters has taken something it values, and it just seemed like the right place to afford a detailed look at the thing (earlier scenes have mostly been sounds, brief glimpses, and anxious rumors). If I'm just looking to crank (easier to work than a ratchet) up the tension for its own sake, it feels like I have my priorities wrong.

 

[wordwalker]

Actually I don't think I release and then re-tighten tension like that much-- I'd rather tighten it again or throw in a new angle without it lightening the first time. At least, when I have a sense that the problem should keep going, I can feel myself starting to lie if I claim it might have gotten fixed to early, and it seems like every reader is going to see the trick for what it is. So usually, I just double down on the problems directly.

 

[ThinkerX]

'Empire: Country' is based on something like this: the characters convince themselves that a serious supernatural menace is actually much less serious and mundane...then its too late.