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Peripheral Plotting – a trick to widening your suspense plot

By on March 14, 2011 in How do I write Tension?, Plotting, Suspense

You need to employ some Peripheral Plotting! Peripheral Plotting is the technique of pulling in ancillary elements and using them to create more tension in your plot. Ideally, they will make your character have to tap into a more noble instinct and push them along their journey. How does Peripheral Plotting work?  I’m going to veer away from Cellular and Eagle Eye for a moment – only because they are such straightforward plots, and look at Live Free or Die Hard the latest in the Bruce Willis saves the world saga. Live Free or Die Hard is a perfect example of peripheral plotting.  Basically, through the Internet, the bad guys are trying to take over all the transportation, finances and utilities in the United States, and if they succeed, the […]

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How to use “Sacrifice” in your suspense novel – some examples

By on March 8, 2011 in Editing Basics

Yesterday I talked about building that essential element of sacrifice into the emotional journey of  your suspense novel.  It thought it would help to show some of the ways I’ve built this into my novels: Here’s how I’ve used sacrifice:  In Taming Rafe, Rafe sacrifices his trophies and everything he’s earned. Rafe (Taming Rafe) would never turn his back on bull riding and his accomplishments. Not when it is the only thing he believes gives him value. Unless he believes that it doesn’t matter how much he’s worked for, it’s all gone. In that moment, he might even despise his past, and all that he worked for that netted him nothing.             So, in a scene that exemplifies this, Rafe burns everything he’s worked so hard for.   In Finding Stefanie, […]

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The Great Sacrifice – the secret to a powerful emotional journey

By on March 7, 2011 in Editing Basics

A great suspense has a sacrifice that touches our heart.  It does’t have to be a physical death – it can be a death of pride, or hope, or a dream.  But a sacrificial moment reveals how your character has changed during the journey, and completes their transformation into a hero. What is that Sacrifice?  A sacrifice is  thing your character can’t surrender/do at the beginning he can do at the end. The Sacrificial Act is found by asking: What would your character do, or never surrender?  And then follow up with the question: What would make him do/surrender it?   You must put this scene into your plot. You know your character well enough by now to understand what he’d never do. The scene that must be included in your […]

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But I’m not a hero, am I? Helping your hero discover his heroic side!

By on March 1, 2011 in Heroism, Suspense

A great story has a great hero – someone who discovers they are hero along that way.  Acts of Heroism are those character-change actions that take your character from an everyday Joe to a Hero. It’s not the grand gestures, the great sacrifices…Acts of Heroism are the everyday acts of our character that push him beyond himself. Ideally in a story, every choice your character makes and every step beyond his comfort zone that he or she takes, is going to push your character farther and farther from the person he starts as, until finally he becomes a full- fledged hero. Let’s go back to two of my favorite movies – Eagle Eye and Cellular Eagle Eye is the story of an everyday guy faced with the accusation that he’s […]

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