All Write - Fiction Advice

Anticipation isn’t at the forefront of a writer’s mind, but it’s an equally important element for creating a good, page turning story. Isn’t anticipation the same as tension?   Not quite.   Writers use tension like a rubber band, they flex it to heighten tense moments during a story and then loosen their grip when they want to relax things or lull the reader into a false sense of security, but creating anticipation is a little different. A sense of anticipation is all about expectation . The reader is expecting something to happen; they’re expecting Character A will do something drastic, they’re expecting the story to conclude with a showdown…and so on. In a way, the reader is quietly predicting what will happen as the story unfolds, so writers need to divert that expectation so that the plot isn’t as predictable as readers think. And the way writers do that is by creating uncertainty and doubt to develop a different sense of anticipation. Think of a football competition – o...

Every story requires narration – it’s the glue that binds the dialogue and the description to the framework of your story, but if not done correctly, it can cause problems for writers. The narration in a novel is most often either first person or third person. It’s the informative stuff that the reader needs to help them follow the story – background information, facts, non-active description and character revelation. Narration is the ‘telling’ part of writing, not the showing. It fills the gaps between description, active scenes, and dialogue. It’s an essential part of storytelling, but as with so many things when it comes to writing, it’s easy to provide too much of it. When used correctly, narrative can help to control pace – it can slow the story when necessary. This allows the reader to take a breather from the action while they process prior information or events. It also gives the writer time to establish background details, give more information, move the story to the ne...

The great thing about fiction writing is that writers can manipulate time to move the story forward; however, there are also times that need to move the story backward.   This is the premise of a flashback or indirect recollection. Part 1 looked at how to move the story forward to clearly show the reader the passing of time – known as transition – so that they understand a period of time has continued from one scene or chapter to another, without confusing things. That ability to control time in a novel gives the writer the freedom to show much more to the reader than reality would allow. In order to tell the entire story, time must be controlled, whether that’s going forward or backward. That way, the readers can that see that some events that have happened in the past directly relate to the present story. If used correctly, the use of flashback – known as analepsis – is a good way of providing necessary or vital information to the reader to keep the story moving forwar...