 | High-tension scenes feel like climbing a roller-coaster hill, ratcheting up the anxiety to the breaking point until we plunge over the other side. Scenes may also resemble a mountain hike: a series of crests and dips before we reach the epiphany—or dark canyon. Or they may be structured like a bar-room brawl, battering the reader with one devastating blow after another until our story protagonist either crumples into a broken heap or staggers out the door. |
Elizabeth Sims, in You’ve Got a Book in You, has a very simple scene blueprint: “You show your hero going after something. He or she doesn’t get it, gets defeated, then regroups and forges a new path to victory. Scene by scene, that’s it.”
 | In Techniques of the Selling Writer, Dwight Swain defines scene as “a unit of conflict, of struggle, lived through by the character and reader. It’s a blow-by-blow account of somebody’s time-unified effort to attain an immediate goal despite face-to-face opposition.” Swain outlines scene structure as Goal→Conflict→Disaster. The scene goal must be “specific and concrete and immediate” a “target so explicit that you [could] photograph your hero” attaining it. The outcome of the goal “must raise an intriguing question for the future—a question designed to keep your reader reading. . . . As a tool, the scene is designed to make the most of conflict. To that end, it organizes conflict elements. It telescopes them. It intensifies them.” |
Karl Iglesias (Writing for Emotional Impact) describes a scene as a mini-story “with a clear beginning, middle, and end, a dramatic question, rising tension, and a climax, which should lead the reader into the next scene."
The opening set-up hooks the reader into the scene and the denouement (or sequel) shows the character processing scene events and/or planning their next move.
Iglesias says every scene “has a triple duty—advance the story forward through conflict, reveal additional character layers, and more importantly, have an emotional impact on the reader—whether it creates tension, arouses curiosity and anticipation, or even surprises the reader.”
The opening set-up hooks the reader into the scene and the denouement (or sequel) shows the character processing scene events and/or planning their next move.
Iglesias says every scene “has a triple duty—advance the story forward through conflict, reveal additional character layers, and more importantly, have an emotional impact on the reader—whether it creates tension, arouses curiosity and anticipation, or even surprises the reader.”
In Story, Robert McKee says a scene “is a story in miniature” played out in real time that substantially changes “the condition of a character’s life.” The moment of decisive change, or turning point, in the scene is most powerful, Mckee says, if it involves a painful choice between irreconcilable desires (she can have only one and not both) or the lesser of two evils (both choices involve pain or loss).
This dilemma will have emotional meaning for the reader if three conditions are met:
This dilemma will have emotional meaning for the reader if three conditions are met:
- “First, we must empathize with the character.
- Second, we must know what the character wants and want the character to have it.
- Third, we must understand the values at stake in the character’s life.”
 | Elizabeth George (Write Away) notes: “Scenes are for drama, so make sure events you render are dramatically depicted. Make sure the scene creates dramatic questions in the mind of the reader.” This drama is created through conflict: “During the course of the scene, tension should rise as the conflict brews. At the height of the conflict you should have the climax and what follows should be a form of resolution that propels the entire novel forward.” |
Donald Maass recommends that characters have emotional goals in story scenes, in his excellent writing book The Emotional Craft of Fiction.
Emotional goals are best illustrated by showing the character’s emotional desire entering the scene, hinting at their secret fears or intense motivations for fulfilling this emotional goal, and then showing their emotional response after scene events.
Emotional goals are best illustrated by showing the character’s emotional desire entering the scene, hinting at their secret fears or intense motivations for fulfilling this emotional goal, and then showing their emotional response after scene events.
 | In Character, Emotion, & Viewpoint, Nancy Kress has practical tips for writing a scene: “You don’t have to think about the whole book at once, the entire emotional arc, or the progressive motivations of six different characters. All you have to do right now is write this one scene. And the way you do that well is by knowing, before you write, exactly what the scene is supposed to accomplish . . . what you want this scene to do.” |
James Scott Bell explains one approach to scene writing in his book, Plot & Structure. He recommends starting scenes with a hook “that grabs the reader’s attention” and pulls them into the narrative. “Try different opening paragraphs. . . . You’ll soon happen upon the hook that feels right.”
Keep reader interest by generating scene conflict: “pack your scenes with tension.” He says, “Always go over the scenes you’ve written with an eye for intensity level. If it isn’t strong enough, try to ratchet it up.”
“Finally you need to end scenes with a prompt, something to make readers turn the page.” Prompts can be impending disaster, intense emotions, a surprising revelation, a major decision, or unanswered question.
Keep reader interest by generating scene conflict: “pack your scenes with tension.” He says, “Always go over the scenes you’ve written with an eye for intensity level. If it isn’t strong enough, try to ratchet it up.”
“Finally you need to end scenes with a prompt, something to make readers turn the page.” Prompts can be impending disaster, intense emotions, a surprising revelation, a major decision, or unanswered question.
Example: Brymaeca sneaks into the enemy stronghold to retrieve her dead son’s severed arm in this excerpt from a yet-to-be-published short story:
I slipped inside King Hrodgar’s mead-hall. The rancid tang of unwashed bodies and yeasty bite of spilled mead congealed the air. Fireplace embers cast an eerie orange glow onto dreaming men littering the benches and floor.
A trophy glittered in the rafters: my son’s severed arm in its silver-scaled armor. What manner of monster wrenched a warrior apart then used his sundered limb as a prize?
I tip-toed through the slumbering men, silent as smoke lest they wake and doom my mission. I leapt lightly onto the table beneath the arm and used a discarded meat knife to slice the leather straps binding it to the rafter.
A frail old man stared up at me, raven-black eyes shining in the fire’s glow. Aeschere. King Hrodgar’s dearest friend. Aeschere remained the one man of honor in Hordgar’s warrior-hoard. He would let me escape with my son’s arm without sounding the alarm, or so I hoped.
The safe choice, the wise choice, was to flee with the severed arm and ensure my son’s body was complete in the afterworld—which meant leaving his murder unavenged.
Another choice bloomed, a chance to shatter King Hrodgar’s heart in retaliation for my son’s death and the years of humiliation he forced on my defeated people. It meant probable death if the warriors woke, and more bloodshed between our tribes. I wished it was anyone other than noble Aeschere waiting for me to choose.
I slipped inside King Hrodgar’s mead-hall. The rancid tang of unwashed bodies and yeasty bite of spilled mead congealed the air. Fireplace embers cast an eerie orange glow onto dreaming men littering the benches and floor.
A trophy glittered in the rafters: my son’s severed arm in its silver-scaled armor. What manner of monster wrenched a warrior apart then used his sundered limb as a prize?
I tip-toed through the slumbering men, silent as smoke lest they wake and doom my mission. I leapt lightly onto the table beneath the arm and used a discarded meat knife to slice the leather straps binding it to the rafter.
A frail old man stared up at me, raven-black eyes shining in the fire’s glow. Aeschere. King Hrodgar’s dearest friend. Aeschere remained the one man of honor in Hordgar’s warrior-hoard. He would let me escape with my son’s arm without sounding the alarm, or so I hoped.
The safe choice, the wise choice, was to flee with the severed arm and ensure my son’s body was complete in the afterworld—which meant leaving his murder unavenged.
Another choice bloomed, a chance to shatter King Hrodgar’s heart in retaliation for my son’s death and the years of humiliation he forced on my defeated people. It meant probable death if the warriors woke, and more bloodshed between our tribes. I wished it was anyone other than noble Aeschere waiting for me to choose.
- Scene Purpose: set up the final confrontation between Brymaeca and King Hrodgar’s champion.
- Scene Goal: retrieve her son’s severed arm so he can enter the afterworld whole.
- Emotional Goal: suppress her shame over her son’s death and her people’s defeat.
- Scene Conflict: Aeschere sees her; the other warriors will try to kill her.
- Dramatic Question: Will she escape with the arm but leave her son/people unavenged—or risk death to kill Aeschere and avenge her son?
Stay tuned for publication updates . . .
For more writing tips read Creating Microtension, Writing with Authority,
Multiple Storylines, Crafting Emotional Resonance
For more writing tips read Creating Microtension, Writing with Authority,
Multiple Storylines, Crafting Emotional Resonance
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