screaming

Have you watched that scene in Cabaret, where Lisa Minnelli runs under a viaduct, waits for a train to roar over her head, then screeeeeeams?


First time I got a rejection slip, I wanted to do that. Sadly – no railway close enough, so I put on a DVD instead. It might even have been Cabaret; I’m a sucker for musicals when I’m down.

It felt like a surgeon had removed my stomach in an emergency gastrectomy and now he was contemplating pre-frontal lobotomy, because my head was buzzing so hard, logical thinking was impossible.

No chance of telling myself, with fingers still burning from the touch of poisoned paper, that rejection is common to every writer. Each editor’s desk is littered with submissions, even those of publications that pay badly, or not at all. Editors will – must – take what they like and send the rest back in boomerang time.

I was sure this editor had barely glanced at my manuscript before he placed it, with the horrid little rejection slip, into the SAE. And I was probably right. After all, he doesn’t have to take unsolicited work. He didn’t ask me to send it.

The movie ending was sad. I dried my tears and took a deep breath, finally ready to read the slip. Right at the bottom something was scribbled in black pen. A jotting, telling me why they’d rejected my work.

I clung to those words. They felt like a glimmer of light when you’re lost under the Mendips. I rewrote the piece, taking note of them. I did that a lot, over the next few years – the entire routine, I mean –rejection arrives in the post...watch the movie...tears...read the slip...rewrite...resubmit...

Finally, a letter arrived. A cheque fluttered out.

I drove right across town to the railway viaduct and screeeeeeeamed....

TOP TEN PLACES TO WRITE YOUR MASTERPIECE

 1. Railway carriages. Long journeys over rattling rails helps your mind to become contemplative, almost trance-like. The constant movement of the scene outside encourages your imagination to follow trajectories, invent plots , link themes , see outcomes, understand characters and visualize landscapes.


2. Bed. While you are lying there, waiting for blessed sleep to descend, you might start to daydream a little about the characters or scenes in your latest story. Don't worry if you drop off to sleep in the middle of this; you're bound to recall snippets of it later. And if you can't sleep - if your mind is buzzing with ideas - don't fight it. Keep a notepad by the bed so that all those good ideas can be jotted down. Never mind the morning grind. Matchsticks are the sign of a writer!


3. The garden shed. Obviously, I’m not suggesting you share it with the lawn mower. But if you’re
 lacking a ‘room of your own’, to quote Virginia Wolfe, a little wooden shack at the bottom of the garden might be the answer.

4. The library. The idea place. It’s out of the house, so if your major writing problens us that people insist on stopping you while you work from home, or 'drop in for coffee’ as if you're a person of leisure, then the library is an ideal office. It has Internet access, tables and chairs, and all the research facilities you'll ever need. When inspiration dries, you can wander round the shelves, noting down interesting titles, to get yourself going again.

5. The park. Fair-weather writers can find all the stories they ever need in a park. It is full of people interacting and reacting with each other. There’s the couple whose dogs fell in love before they did...the father who brings his son here on his access day...the woman who pushes her elderly aunt out in a wheelchair...what are their stories? Or rather, what are the stories you might write for them?

6. The beach. Holidays tell great tales. Toss the sunblock to oneside, prop up the deck chair and spill the beans onto paper.


7. The local cafe. Take a tip from JKR and finish your novel over a cold latte. It may end up a bit stained and damp, but you will be in exhulted company. Which leads us to...

8. Under the stairs...or any bit of dwelling place you can cleverly transform into an office space. Once you are thinking of  this area as 'office space', you will have somewhere where all your things can be stored together (rather than scattered around the place) and where, as soon as you sit to write, a little 'tap' gets turned on in the writing part of your brain, as it thinks...ah, here I am, in the place where words spill effortlessly from my pen...

9. In front the telly. I am not joking - I spent the whole of one writing year writing in on an easy chair, my laptop (suitably) positioned on my lap. It was the only option, so I took it. I was able to 'switch off' from whatever antique was being sold at a boot sale, but there are always ear plugs to help this along. The downside to this option is your seating position; it's not good for your back to balance a laptop on your knees. I did end up seeing an osteopath! But I got of lot of writing done. So if your only writing opportunity and location is while everyone else is wrapped up in Eastenders, get out the earplugs.


10. The kitchen table...of course! Hands up if you eat regularly at your dining table. Hands up again if it's actaully covered in stuff that really ought to be put away. How about storing your writing equipment in a nice strong box, a little larger than A4 size, and leaving it in a corner of the table? Then when you need to write, you take the box off the table, take out the necessary and use the newly-gained space to write on. And if it really is in the kitchen, you won't have to move far to make a coffee.

A Fleeting Moment of a Wider Picture

There is no warning; one moment I’m gaping up at the reading lamp, wishing I could switch it off because its heat is burning my face so badly I can’t breath; the next I’m above it, looking down.
I’m floating above the light, above the bed, above myself in it.
There are two of me now, the ethereal floaty me and the creature lying prone. I know which one I am – no doubt – I am the one looking down. The other one below is the thing I floated out of, and I was pleased to do it because it felt bad; breathless and oven-baked and faint and sore in a weird internal sort of way
The metal shade of the lamp throws a glow over the proceedings. I can see everything clearly, but I feel no connection. I’m not scared or angry, or even confused; although it is apparent that everyone round me is frantic with confusion. I see them as if they are birds, the perching, flocking sort of bird that is small and anxious. They move as if they have both wings and very small feet with a short gait. One flutters in, hovers over me so that the spotlight is on the back of her head now, on the stripes of her dress and her tight ponytail. She flutters off and brings more of the flock back. They hover, raising their voices. I can hear the words, but I’m not all that concerned. Crash, they say. Quick! Arrest. CPR. Phone – no – button. Dammit!
One glances up. I soar away. Strangely, I don’t want to be seen. I am a bit embarrassed about floating. Anything like this is embarrassing to me – I never like to complain in a shop, or be the one that trips in the street. I like to be invisible, normal. But, no, she is not looking at me. She is adjusting the light, so that it shines on my face. Yep, that’s my exterior, but not in great shape. Too white, with that waxy gleam my mother’s kitchen floor always had. Eyes dull in the head, staring into oblivion. Mouth open. I look ugly, stupid.
I look dead.
I am having a baby. I can see that it is in me, a big round hill of baby underneath the pale counterpane. But something was going wrong with my blood, I was poisoning the vacuum sealed compartment the baby lives in. So, looking down like this, seeing my other self and the baby it contains under the spotlight, I’m glad I’m out of there, because now they can take the baby away from the body that is destroying it and make it better. Offer it light, air, warmth, food. Nowadays, they can do anything, can’t they? The incubator is equivalent to the mother’s womb. You pop the baby in and feed it through a tube until it can suckle. Simple…the baby won’t need my poisoning system anymore. And from up here, which is both just above the bedstead and also in another place entirely, I can made that kind of dispassionate decision. I can see that I don’t matter. I am not so very important in the overall scheme of things. Life will revolve and go one and go on again so long as the next generation exists.
The baby is crucial.
Even though I don’t like being in the spotlight, even though I don’t like to create a scene, I float down at little, in case they can hear me.
Save the baby, I say. Save the baby, not me.

The rest of the flock have fluttered in and are hovering over me. One has thrown curtains round the bed, another has tossed the pillows to the floor, where the little nurse who comes to wash me flicks them away from under the feet of the flock. Each has their own job, and seem to know it. Two of them lay me flat, quickly, neatly.
Save the baby, I try to remind them, but they are not listening. A massive block of apparatus on wheels is rolled through the doors of the ward which crash open and bang shut behind the thing that sways like moon buggy with its shiny, hooked antennae holding a bag of clear fluid, swaying along the ward with the woman pulling it shouting something and the nurse with the ponytail responding with one word.
She puts her face on mine. I drift closer. She is kissing me better. I cannot feel the kiss on my mouth, but something lifts in me, something inside my solar plexus pulls…tugs…

And I am back. I open my eyes and the flock of birds dart back, as if I am a cat. They chirp and tweet. One of them says, ‘hello!’
Hello.
You’re fine, they say, later, while I’m recovering. It was a kind of surgical shock from the pre-eclampsia. It won’t happen again. You’re fine.
I nod. I can’t tell them. It would feel irreverent, after their efforts, that all I wanted them to do was save the baby.
But from time to time, as my child toddles, then walks, then runs, I recall that feeling, the desire I had as I gazed down on my body.
It reassures me.

FINDING THE LIFE-BLOOD OF WRITING

There are many strange truths about writing. In my ‘quote of the week’, John Gardiner sums one of them up perfectly. The more detail you chose to include, the less boring the writing becomes. Skimming over a description loses the reader, zoning-in absorbs him. It’s yet another way to create fiction that is strong, absorbing and energetic
Remember, you don’t have to describe the whole of something. That is the difference between a chunk of description and the detail of it. By looking closely at the most interesting parts of the whole – whether it’s an artifact, a person, a landscape or an interior – the description of it will be enhanced. The reader won’t want to see it all, because that’s like being too close to the screen in the cinema – too much information.
Symbolism can truly help to get to the core of what you want to say. Using it is fairly simply. Take something symbolic and examine that as a single descriptive detail of the whole.
To find the right symbol, think about the ‘core’ of the thing. For example, your scene is an inner city waste land. Don’t try to describe all of it, your reader’s eyes will glaze over. Instead, focus your imagery on one blighted buddleia, seemingly imbedded in nothing more than rocks and dust, where no butterfly has ever ventured.
Of course, your first draft may be rushed, with not much detail – you are trying as much to get down your thoughts on the story as to write it. It’s fine to end up with a rushed first copy that is possibly ¼ as long as the eventual manuscript. But whether you start this way and return to the beginning, or prefer to get in close in your first draft, when you do this, you’ll find it will actually help you understand your story. It will highlight the small, vital moments that add up to the whole.
This is quite the opposite as providing chunks of description. Today’s readers are not keen on chunks of either description or exposition – that died out with the bustle – so the way to add interesting detail is to slide it in surreptitiously as the action, interior monologue and dialogue continues to move the story on. On the other hand, try not to cram too much description into a short space of words. This tentancy is also the opposite close-up detail, which takes the time…and the amount of words…it has to take to be itself. If you delve into vivid, symbolic imagery while creating your action, dialogue and narrative moments, you will bring your writing alive.
So this is the strange truth…the more detail you chose to include, the less boring the writing becomes…moving into close-up is absorbing and paints the imagery of the story.
Here’s a fast first draft version of a moment in my latest book for children:

The captain’s knife cut into Jake’s cheek.
‘You’re my slave, with my mark on you, boy,’ said Captain Elliot. ‘We’re bound for England on the next tide, and you’re coming with me.’

There’s nothing wrong with getting the bare-boned basics down in this way. What you’ll have is a sort of fusion between draft and plot outline.
Writing fast without putting in the detail is something you might want to do when your head is full of plot – or conflict between two characters. But having got it out of your head and on to paper, you can go back and look for those details that will not only brighten the writing style, but also help you ‘see’ the images you’re creating on the page – it’s essential that you can visualize exactly what is happening in any scene, as this brings the entire narrative alive.
Once I’d written this tiny section, I could begin to imagine what it was like to be there, on the quay side, for Jake:

The captain grasped Jake’s ear and held him firmly. The knife from his belt glinted silver in the hot noon sun, yet it felt like ice as it slid down Jake’s cheek.
‘You’re my slave, with my mark on you, boy.’
Blood dripped. Jake felt it tickle its way down like a raindrop. It ran behind the iron collar that had been round his neck since the Captain had paid good English Stirling for Jake in the marketplace.
‘We’re bound for England on the next tide.’ Captain Elliot liked to chew tobacco and the black spit flew everywhere, smelling of the tang of the sea. It landed on Jake’s cheek, mingled with the oozing blood. He felt the chain jerk at his neck, felt the screech of pain from the raw skin. He tried to swallow, but there was no spit left in his mouth.
‘And you’re coming with me.’

In this fuller version, I’ve ‘seeded in’ description by using symbolic imagery. I don’t tell you what the Captain is wearing (although I could later), I focus on his aggression via the knife and his general unpleasantness via the tobacco. Notice that I’ve added the sense of touch (the icy knife, the warm trickle of the blood, the pain of the collar) to the passage, and craftily added the smell of the sea via the tobacco. You don’t need to squash every sense into a single description, but sound, touch, taste and smell do work exceedingly well to draw a reader into an image.
I’ve tried to avoid describing Jake’s emotions, though, because that often ends up in telling, rather than showing… ‘Jake was scared.’ I’ve gone for showing, through his dry mouth, which links back to the opposite symbolism of the squidgy, wet tobacco wedge that the captain is chewing. I've tried to imbed the entire description between dialogue and action.
You might like to try the Exercises of the Week – like me, chose a bit of your own work and see what you can make of it.

WRITING FROM YOUR OWN INSPIRATION

I first experienced an ‘inspired visualization’ in the home of a Druid Priestess. There were twelve or so of us sprawled out on her carpet. I laid my jumper over my eyes and listened to her seductive voice describe an imaginary landscape, telling us to smell the scents and look around us. She called this ‘using our psychic eyes’, which, apparently, were open behind our closed lids.

At first, thoughts kept getting in the way… do I look a prat lying here…is my bag of Chorizos good enough for the communal table? Bit-by-bit, I began seeing things that felt very real. I could feel the grass beneath bare feet, hear a skylark singing. Her voice faded away, and it was up to me what happened next. It was, in fact, just like plotting a story.

Visualization is used regularly as a therapeutic tool to help people with difficulties, and within various spiritual paths to explore the subconscious, and…whether they know it or not…by most writers. A mild trance state takes you from one world (physical, concrete) into another (spirit-based and ethereal).

Trance states are not all that rare. The rhythmic waves that are the electrical impulses of our brains beat at various speeds. When we are alert and about our daily business, they’re fast-paced. When deeply asleep, they slow dramatically. But as writers, we can tap into the cycles that lie between sleep and alertness, when the waves slow to an Alpha rhythm.

It’s that common experience in the supermarket. Tin of beans in hand, our minds soar off somewhere. When a passing friend calls our name, we don’t hear them, and if they tap our shoulders, we jump, hopefully without dropping the beans on their foot. Writers can take advantage of ‘losing of yourself’. In this slower state of thinking, the relaxed, twilight world of the trance, vivid imagery flashes into the mind’s eye.

Like most other writers, I’m fascinated by how plots, characters and entire scenes arrive from nowhere, and recognize that the act of physical writing is merely the setting down of the words and pictures that have already appeared in our imaginations - whether that happened moments, weeks or years before we write. But the guided visualization in the house of the Druid made me ask, what is our imagination? What happens when we visit the world of ‘story’ – when characters stand gazing out from headlands, the salt spray on their lips, despite the fact we’re actually doing the washing up?

Enhancing this imaginative process enables the writing to become sharper, more ‘present’, more melodic. Settings have colour, taste, smell and the subtlest background sounds all built in. The techniques are simple, but need clear instructions to help their effectiveness.

Deliberately entering an imagined world begins by finding a quiet place. The journey into a ‘story’ starts with gentle breathing and waiting for the thoughts that drift, unbidden, through your mind to become focused.

Imagine, for instance, turning the pages of a book. To find your story, keep gently turning pages, moving along until you’ve left the physical realm outside your body behind and are actually inside your own head. Allow the experience to take shape in anyway it likes – words, pictures, symbols, dance, feelings. Don’t worry if you fall asleep – take advantage of those ‘drifting’ moments that are even deeper than the Alpha brain wave state.

If your writing relates to a particular world, you may like to play music that will summon up the appropriate image, but keep the noise level down and avoid song – the words will overtake your own internal dreaming.

Place your notebook and pen by your, and, as soon as you are back, write down everything you experienced. This is the most important part of the exercise. Write immediately, using a freewriting technique, not stopping to correct your work. Describe in detail whatever comes to you.

When you’re stuck for something to write, visualization will send you in search of childhood memories or forgotten moments of passion. If you’re stuck at a point in a story, you can seek the clues to the puzzles of your plot. You can become your character’s therapist, or watch them choose what they wear, eat, drive. You will soon find that your mind is full of startling revelations and things jump out at you and demand to be written down.

Imagination is where your writing begins – using this ‘visualization’ technique, you can enter it and roam around it at will. Writing will spill out. You’ll never be afraid of the ‘blank page’ again…you’ll be writing directly from your own inspiration.

THE CHICKEN OR THE EGG?

My ‘How to Book’ on keeping chickens poses the question…‘What came first, the chicken or the egg?’ Quick as you like comes the pithy reply… ‘Neither. It was the dinosaur.’

You might ask the same question about fiction. ‘What comes first, character or plot?’ And the answer might be…that old dinosaur…whichever turns you on, of course.’

I’m not entirely joking (which must be a relief, for those that appreciate good jokes). I think the personality of the writer has a lot to do with how they approach this subject.

Some people can’t help being ideas dudes. Writers from Agatha Christie to Philip Pullman come in this category. Their thoughts revolve around subject and concept, and the characters simply have to accept their slightly secondary role in their creators’ minds.

Others see new people in their mind’s eye and immediately begin the story of their lives…which slowly evolves into plot. My friend Gail is of this bent. It seems to me that her entire life has been accompanied by imaginary people who feel as real to her as her own family, and whose stories she know more intimately than the lives of her friends. But she will admit that creating satisfying novels that sell, is not easy for her. The characters go their cavalier way about things and refused to be straight-jacketed into plots.

The secret is…well, it isn’t a secret, really...it's that old middle way. Compromise. Fusion. Knowing your own failings and working with them. Not a secret…more a  dinosaur.

As you write – or rather as you read – your first draft, ask yourself; is this story plot-led? Is this story character-based? Chicken? Or Egg? Whichever is the answer to the question, look to the other side of things. Give extra time and energy to the weakest half of the story dilemma.

Chickens
In character-led stories, put time aside to work on the plot, using whatever methods you find most useful – try some or all of the following:
• Index cards
• ‘Timelines’, that prove your story works in space and time
 • Web diagrams
 • Meditations – ‘day dream’ your way to a better plot
• Redrafting techniques
• ‘Brainstorming’ – use your friends to help you get it right
• Whiteboards or pinboards linking your freshest ideas
 • Freewriting techniques
If what you love is character, you might be of the opinion that plotting is dull and stifles the life out of your writing. Try to think of it as a challenging puzzle that will allow your characters to live on the page. Quality plotting can bring out their hidden flaws, create complexities and make them one hundred percent convincing.

Eggs
In subject-driven stories, the writer should put aside their passion for careful plotting and give equal time to get to know their characters. This is best done ‘off page’:
• Candidate characters should first fill out a ‘personality CV’ in the shape of a questionnaire.
• Then, find an appropriate photo or make a sketch on the character
• Note down all the physical characteristics- from moles and tattoos to weak hips and a tendency to nibble a thumb nail. Not down accent, mannerisms, dress sense, body language and any other characteristic you can think of.
• Having noted physical and personality details, write a ‘character portfolio’
• List the things found in their pockets or handbag
• Enter the room this character thinks of as their own and poke around.
• Interview the character – they may surprise you.
• Finally, use the Health Spa Exercise for this week to see how your character responds when they find themselves sharing a table with another character.

Cause and Effect is thought of as part of the plotting mechanism, but in fact it is a technique that can be used to ‘fuse’ plot and character successfully. It can have a riveting effect on the plotting of your stories. Readers love to see the ‘story build up’, through events, thoughts, character traits etc., that are set up in the early moment then link and develop the story towards the end.

A way of utilizing ‘cause and effect’ is to build up tension. An excellent ‘aide memoir’ for this is the ‘5 C’s…Characters Conquering Conflict Create Conclusion. Explore, as you’re working on a story, how you might represent the conflicts that characters – especially the main character – have to struggle against…and how or if they will overcome them. This works whether you choose to summon up your characters first and let them build up the plot by the conflict they create, or have a model in mind which needs characters to fulfil its potential. Either way, you must know why they are in this story, and make them grow on the page, so let the characters show how the action works by keeping them under constant stress.

Be a Dinosaur!
Don’t be ruled by the chicken and egg dilemma; in your first draft, it’s better to be a bit of a dinosaur and take the middle way.

MAKING A DRAMA OF IT: Tension in your Fiction.

One of the most useful techniques writer can stuff under their belt is the ability to control tension and create drama in their story – regardless of whether it is a piece of micro-fiction or the length of Moby Dick (whale or book). The challenges are subtly different – in a novel it’s keeping the tension going sufficiently to entice the reader the less dramatic chapters, whilst in short stories, creating a balance between the peaks and the necessary lulls in a tight space can be a test of skill.
Some apprentice writers have trouble isolating the drama in their work and often miss all the tricks in cranking up tension. They assume that events in a story will come across as dramatic – a mugging, for instance, that’s got to be drama, right? But it is so easy to muffle the tension instead of enhance it. In my children’s  novel for 9+ readers, Just My Luck, I had to write a mugging scene. Here is a first draft extract; the ‘freewrite’ I scribbled down while the scene had newly come into my mind…

They were gaining on me. Each time I reached a corner, their footsteps were louder. I ran into a courtyard, hoping to lose them by twisting and turning. Instantly, I realized that I'd blown it. I was in a parking area at the back of some shops. There was only one way in - and out.
They stopped abruptly when they saw me, trapped and defeated. They began to spread out so that I had no chance of scooting around them. I stepped backwards as they moved in slowly. Then I realized I was doing what they wanted, I was backing into a wall. There'd be a moment when I could go no further, when they might pounce.
I gave it one last shot. I sprang forwards, taking them by surprise, head down, holding my skates in front of me like weapons, hurling myself between two of them. I felt hands reach out to grab me, snatch a bit of my sleeve, then one of them leapt at me, wrapping his arms round my legs in a rugby tackle. I put out my hands as the wet, glinting cobbles came up to meet me, but my nose and chin seemed to take most of the impact. The hot pain that comes when you lose a lot of skin swept over my face.
They were surrounding me. I closed my eyes as the first kick came, pulling my knees and folding my arms round my head. This was it, I thought. The very last of my bad luck. The very end of it.
A boot dug sharp into the back of my head…

As muggings go, this one is pretty mundane at the moment, but there is so much I can now do to heighten the tension and turn this into an extreme dramatic experience for character and reader alike.

Control your Reader
Some stories prefer to jog along at a steady pace until ‘bang!’ the tension is loosed like a cannon shot – often towards the end. Other stories build up tension slowly and steadily from the beginning, like tightening the elastic band on one of those little plastic aeroplanes. To help you understand how your drama functions, think about the affect you want to have on your reader. In fact focus right in on your reader’s stomach. When we read edgy, dramatic pages, our stomach knots up alongside the characters’. At first it might just be a butterfly flutter of worry. But as the tension takes hold, we begin to grip the cover tight and pant with anxiety. The writer achieves this affect by controlling what happens in the reader’s mind (and in his steadily knotting stomach) moment by moment within the narrative.
Once you have a first draft – at least in your own head or scribbled onto a plot outline –looking at how the way you tell the story will directly affect the knots in the reader’s stomach. This might mean presenting the ‘threat/mystery’ earlier in the story. Equally, it might mean holding off on the true mystery, while mini ‘subplot’ threats are seeded in.
The excerpt above is an early scene in the book – it sets the plot moving. So it should present an ‘explosion’ near the beginning that can set the blood racing and encourage the reader to then move through the next chapters - ones that burn slowly in comparison. I should let that explosion really rip. I might need to re-jig the sequence of events a bit and I should be careful not to race through it. I need to let the character (Brandon) tell his story at his own pace.

Get inside a head
Scenes should be described from inside the mind of the character most affected by any rise in tension and drama. If this isn’t possible – because your 1st person protagonist is watching the event, for instance – you must be sure that they are intensely affected by what they see – that they are able to empathize with the affected person. (Unless, of course, what you want to demonstrate is that your protagonist isn’t good at empathy, or doesn’t consider this a drama at all. If that is the case, the scene won’t be represented to the reader as drama – so be sure this is what you intended.)
Show, don’t tell will kick-start the process. Allow the character to register any physical reactions to the growth of tension inside him…my fists tightened…my heart was thumping against my ribs…my breath was coming in short, painful rasps…
Take all the time you need to make sure the reader is absolutely ‘there’ with the character(s). Don’t race through the action, or fail to report a single word spoken. Stop and use descriptive affects, ‘teasing’ your reader as unbearably as you can. Use strong verbs wherever possible to build tension. Avoid too many adjectives, but don’t avoid description…My fists tightened around the blades of my skates. They were cutting into my palms…My heart was thumping against my ribs but I couldn’t tear my eyes from the gang as my breath came in short painful rasps

Slowing Down
‘Take your time’ and 'slowing down to speed up' are two of of my favourite phrases. Using this technique in narration goes against most ideas of how to create exciting narration. However, it’s incredibly effective.  When you take your time to describe feelings, thoughts, actions, or visuals, you naturally focus in on the details, which make things immediate and pace-high. The more the reader is shown every detail through the main character’s POV, the more they’ll be on edge, suspensefully waiting for the next thing to happen. This technique is what makes a reader’s eyes skim the words, racing to find out what happens next.  

Describing slowly uses several writing skills to create an engaging narrative ––using strong verbs, using the five senses and staying close to the narrative via internal monologue.

You need, however, to be aware that this is the right to to slow down. Taking too much time over the wrong scene or action can simply feel slow. But, if you slow down during an intense scene—allowing the reader to relish each suspenseful detail—then it’s used to good effect. When some is scared, their  senses become heightened.  This is exactly what you need to show in your narrating character – a heightened sense of fear –– and slowing down the action can achieve this.  In the excerpt above, I pummel along, looking neither to the left nor to the right. Brandon would be doing that, after all. I can’t stop the action – it is full pelt. But there are ways of holding it up while not actually stopping it. The simplest is to move into a short internal monologue. This is a renowned way of putting on the brakes at tense moments (some writers take terrible advantage of this, holding off their readers for pages, but that’s quite a risk). I must take as much time as I dare to express Brandon’s thoughts as he confronts the gang …They were gaining on me. Each time I reached a corner, their footsteps were louder – footsteps that rang on cobbled stones. I remember thinking, they're not wearing trainers.

    I saw a turning ahead and swerved into it, hoping to lose them by twisting and turning. Instantly, I saw I'd blown it. I was in a parking area at the back of some shops. These were shops I'd been into, buying chocolate and chewing gum, millions of times. But now I was on the wrong side of them. There were no open doors and racks of sweeties. Just bricked up back walls…
You can see that I’m slowing the action down…writing into the gaps I left in my rush to get the words onto the page. Doing this increases tension. You wouldn’t think that would be so, but it is. The reader longs to be teased. They want to know the end of the story, the solution to the mystery, but when they reach the end they’re saddened. They wanted it to go on for ever. Otherwise Spielberg could have just spliced the first and last scenes in Jaws together and save everyone a whole evening’s viewing, or Bronte could have inscribed …reader, I married him…on the first page of Jane Eyre.

Make it Hard
Slowing down and holding back action works well to tighten the knots in the reader’s stomach. An equally good way is to make the action as difficult as possible. Make achieving a goal, even a small one, as hard as you convincingly can. Let terrible events draw out for as long as you dare, too…A boot dug sharp into the back of my head. There was a cry – I didn’t know if it was them or me. I tried to wriggle away. I felt a dead weight on my back. One of them had sat on me. The boot came again. My eyes filled with blood…

When to Speed Up 

In places – the right places – the action needs to speed back up – the pace to increase. Just as working out when and how to slow down effectively can have a heightening effect, speeding up is an essential tool in the writer's box.  Above, I used certain techniques to speed the action back up. 

I avoided the present participle (look for ‘ing’ endings) and used core verbs (Howled, not howling).

I used short, staccato words, lots of full stops and short paragraphs, snappy dialogue, alliteration and a rhythm within the abruptness.

I avoided the perfect tense, the passive form and abstract words, adverbs  and clichés.

To speed up I tried to make images clear and precise, sharp sights & sounds without over-describing, but metaphors and symbols can work as ‘shorthand description – sneak description into the action.

They howled into the courtyard…I hurled myself between two of them…I sprang forwards…My skates were like weapons…I took a step backwards. They paced forward.…I must not reach the wall...My back was against it, I was trapped...I was a worm. I was going to be squashed...

Once you have your reader’s stomach wound into a knot, it’s difficult to keep that buzz of attention when you know you need to drop the pace again. Try creating a break where the reader can take a breath – ending a scene or chapter on a ‘high’ is an accepted and common method of curtailing high tension moments. Just don’t do this until you’ve extracted every gram of possible stomach-knotting!
Flashbacks work very well at this point in a story, because they put everything completely on ‘hold’ and the reader understands that mechanism (that ‘trick’) and goes with it, taking the ‘mystery’ forward with them in the hope it will later be solved.
Interior monologue has a similar affect. Allow your character to ponder the dramatic moments or allow him to cogitate on a separate but vital issue.
Often, the moment is so dramatic that it needs to be resolved at once. I can’t leave Brandon lying helpless on the ground. Not in chapter three. I need to find a way of saving him so that he can live to tell us the rest of his story.
I’m a bit happier with this section now. It’s tighter and faster, but has variations in pace. I think I feel confident to show you the outcome…

They were gaining on me. Each time I reached a corner, their footsteps were louder – footsteps that rang on cobbled stones. They were not wearing trainers.
I saw a turning ahead and swerved into it, hoping to lose them with twists and turns. Instantly, I saw I'd blown it. I was at the back of some shops. These were shops I'd been into, buying chocolate and chewing gum, millions of times. But now I was on the wrong side of them. There were no open doors and racks of sweeties. Just bricked up walls looming over me, black in the dark courtyard as the gang from the ice rink howled in and stopped abruptly.
I took a step backwards. They paced forward. I stopped. I must not do what they wanted. I must not reach the wall. Once my back was up against it, I was trapped.
They would pounce.
My fists tightened around the blades of my skates. They were cutting into my palms. My heart was thumping against my ribs and my breath came in short painful rasps, but I couldn’t tear my eyes from the gang..
I thought about scooting round them. No chance. They spread out across the courtyard, like they were playing rugby. Suddenly a security light flashed and we were on stage, caught in the spotlight. They didn’t care. They whistled high, tuneless notes, like birds arguing over a worm. They were grinning. Their teeth glinted in the beam of light. They were grinning and whistling over a worm.
They were well spread out. I could get between them. I sprang forwards, head down. My skates were like weapons. I hurled myself between two of them. I felt hands reach out to grab me, snatch a bit of my sleeve, hang on, lose it as I kept running. For a wonderful second, I was free.
One of them leapt at me from behind, wrapping his arms round my legs in a rugby tackle. I put out my hands. The cobbles came up to meet me. The hot pain that comes when you lose a lot of skin swept over my face.

The gang was all round me. I was a worm. I was going to be squashed. Their boots scrape on the stones. I closed my eyes as the first kick came, pulled my knees up as high and folded my arms round my head. This was it, I thought. The last of my bad luck. The very end of it.
A boot dug sharp into the back of my head. There was a cry – I didn’t know if it was them or me. I tried to wriggle away. There was a dead weight on my back. One of them had sat on me. The boot came again. My eyes filled with blood. Least, that's what I thought the redness was. Then I heard the sound of an engine through the fuzz. Smelt the exhaust. A car was rolling into the courtyard.

Okay, you can unknot your stomach now…

Nina Milton's Just My Luck is available on Kindle and paperback. Just click here.