Mindfire
Istar
I want to do something similar to a jump scare in a scene later on. While this is easy to do visually, it's a lot harder to do in written form. In general, anything sudden or surprising is hard to do in written form because of the nature of the medium: the reader will always see it coming because they have to read the words before their mind gets the image. With this in mind, is it even possible to surprise the reader or catch them off guard with anything? (I don't mean a plot twist or unexpected event. That's managed easily enough with foreshadowing, etc. I mean something that seems to come out of nowhere.) In my earlier days I would prefix a sentence with "suddenly", but I've since stopped doing that. Sudden movements just seem to be something that writing is unsuited for. Suggestions? Ideas?