The Case Against Ribbons
By Linda Yezak
Cliff-hangers.
Even cooking shows do them. Ever watched Chopped?
Just as Ted Allen is lifting the cloche to reveal the failed dish, Food Network
jumps to a commercial. And you have to watch. No way you can go through the
rest of the night without knowing who made the worst dessert out of a basketful
of octopus, raisins, and Grape Nehi, right?
Authors should resist the urge to tie everything up with a
pretty little ribbon and, instead, master the art of developing cliff-hangers. Scene
to scene, chapter to chapter, everything should end with something that encourages
the reader to turn the page. And once they do, the author should reward them
with a reason to turn it again.
The most obvious cliffhanger technique is ending the
chapter/scene at an action high-point.
A bullet whizzed past Marissa’s head.
She ducked and twisted to glance behind her. “They’re shooting at us!”
“I can’t think about that right now,”
Justin shouted. He yanked the paddle from one side to the other, trying to
control the kayak’s crazy spin. “Hang on!”
End of chapter.
For the next chapter, the author has all sorts of options: Continue
with Justin and Marissa or divert to another tense spot. Maybe shift the POV to
show the shooter’s frustration over missing the shot and how much trouble he
gets into for his failure. Or maybe slip all the way over to Cornpatch, Iowa,
to show innocent Aunt Minnie getting a garbled phone call about how Marissa will
die if Minnie doesn’t relinquish the golden statue right this minute.
“But I don’t have it! I don’t know
where it is!”
“Then you’ll never see your niece
again!”
Poor Aunt Minnie. She doesn’t know her niece is getting
shot at and is spinning in a kayak caught in a strong current.
For those authors who aren’t writing
action/thriller/suspense novels into which these stop-action chapter endings
can easily be plopped, you can still encourage page turning. High-octane scenes
aren’t the only candidates for cliff-hanger status. Any scene can encourage a
reader to move forward if the author leaves something there to niggle at her
brain.
Did he just find out she’s not a lady
of the court?
He reins his Friesian around to face
her. “If you’re not Lady Cornwall, who are you?”
Wait until the next chapter—or even later—to tell him she’s
a burlesque dancer at the Moulin Rouge on vacation in London.
What if the entire point of the chapter is to allow the reader
to rest while the character reflects? If she’s going to be happy at the end of
the chapter—“He loves me!”—pop her bubble in the next. And if you
really want to assure page-turning, foreshadow the pin that’ll do it. Then put
that pin right under the chapter heading in a short, eye-catching line. This will
encourage a reader to continue.
Will she end the chapter with a resolution to do whatever
needs to get done? As God is my witness, I will
never go hungry again! Then smack her with a roadblock in the
next scene—perhaps one the reader already knows is coming, even if the
character doesn’t.
Has doubt snaked into his confidence? Say so–He frowned at the $14,000 diamond ring in his hand. “What if she
says no?”—and end it there.
Even in slow scenes, the emotion can be amped so when the
fall comes, it’s hard and dramatic. And irresistible to the reader. If the
scene can’t end with action, end with a question, an attitude, an emotion
strong enough to blow the reader’s hair back, but don’t let it end in a tidy
little package.
Look for ways your author can rev up the page-turning
within the context given. Putting a scene or chapter break in the right place
should keep the ribbons away. Which is a good thing. Ribbons come with bookmarks
attached.
Photo by Jess Bailey on Unsplash
Photo by Hu Chen on Unsplash
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