There are a lot of ways for a novelist to create suspense, but also really only two: one a trick, one an art.The trick is to keep a secret. Or many secrets, even. In Lee Childs books, Jack Reacher always has a big mystery to crack, but there are a series of smaller mysteries in the meantime, too, a new one appearing as soon as the last is resolved. J.K. Rowling is another master of this technique Who gave Harry that Firebolt? How is Rita Skeeter getting her info?The art, meanwhile, the thing that makes Pride and Prejudice so superbly suspenseful, more suspenseful than the slickest spy novel, is to write stories in which characters must make decisions. Breaking Bad kept a few secrets from its audience, but for the most part it was fantastically adept at forcing Walter and Jesse into choice, into action. The same is true of Freedom, or My Brilliant Friend, or Anna Karenina, all novels that are hard to stop reading even when it seems as if it should be easy.
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About Charles Finch
Charles Finch was a contemporary American author and literary critic. Charles Finch is an American author and literary critic. He has written a series of mystery novels set in Victorian era England, as well as literary fiction and numerous essays and book reviews. Read more on Wikipedia →