Freele Pesters: Second Edition
During The Second Fiction Workshop Week, Fiction Editor Stefanie Freele Pesters LAR Contributors and Staff about Narrative Tension and Anticipation in the Short Story
Wait! Stop! Don’t quit here. Read this. And this. Something big is going to happen. Something huge. Revealing. Terrifying. Wonderful. Look out! Unexpected. There is a monster at the end of the page. At the end of the book. Lurking at the end of the blog. He has secrets. One for you. And you.
I pestered again, I confess. I haunted them, those judicious authors and demanding editors. I said, give me some dirt about narrative tension, or else, I’ll… and I let them wait while I sipped my coffee, and they leaned forward while I squinted. Squirm they did, until I gave them the next demand: answer these questions or the consequences will be…and they anticipated the worst; they were scared of me no doubt.
Afraid to be left alone on the cliff without the next chapter, they responded. They have no idea how close they came to the inevitable. Not the predictable, the inevitable.
Michael Czyzniejewski – LAR Contributor – “The Nihilist Returns” – Fall 2009
What is essential in fiction to create narrative tension?
Stories are about tension, and tension is about characters making choices. In this story, like many I write, the main character has to make a choice is not suited to make, unable to make, or unwilling to make. Voila: tension up the wazoo. Maybe I don’t do this in every story, but in this one I did.
While you are writing, how conscious are you of the reader?
Like a lot of writers, I write for myself, but I know, at the end, there’s going to be approval from someone that will also get me a jones. Usually, that’s a lit mag editor (i.e., in this case, you), but since my book came out, I’ve been more aware of people actually reading my work. Before my book, I never, ever imagined anyone reading my work. But since EIOB:S, people come up to me and tell me they’ve read my work. I probably didn’t react well, as I was stunned, like, “Wha? Are you making fun of me? You didn’t read my book.”
So now, I think I at least subconsciously think someone might read it. After all, I was 987,345 on Amazon last week.
In your LAR story, “The Nihilist Returns” what elements did you use to keep the reader reading?
There’s an element of mystery here, which the protag goes over in his own head: What happened? How is this possible? The rest of the character was fun to build, but I think there’s the weird element, plus the mystery: How did this guy, who is not religious (the opposite, almost), is not even a nice guy, yet he’s done something that very few people (supposedly) have done. Why him? Why the guy who doesn’t believe in anything, thrust into a position where he has to believe something, lest his head explode? That’s what the idea was originally, and unlike a lot of stories I write, I stuck with that original notion: a guy who doesn’t believe in anything having to explain the unexplainable.
What is the title/author of a short story or novel that you just couldn’t put down?
Lots of favorites, but I’ll push my most recent favorite: “The Taste of Penny” by Jeff Parker is the best collection/book I’ve read in a long time. Go out and buy it and read it now.
Psssst- Intrusion from Freele: also loved The Taste of Penny by Jeff Parker.
Bonnie ZoBell – LAR Contributor – “Rocks” – Spring 2010
What is essential in fiction to create narrative tension?
To make the reader wonder about something that isn’t immediately answered. To make the reader care enough about something that he/she has to keep reading find out what will happen. The job of the writer is to manipulate the reader by not telling everything at once so that it’s not possible to take a peek at the story and then put it down to finish it another time. It has to be read NOW.
What is the title/author of a short story or novel that you just couldn’t put down?
Await Your Reply, a novel by Dan Chaon, is a book I read recently that I just couldn’t put down. The structure in particular impressed me, which made the tension of the story work particularly well. At the beginning, three seemingling unrelated events occur, all of which are shocking or highly disturbing in some way: a boy’s hand is severed, a man has been trying to hunt down his paranoid schizophrenic brother for a decade or so and seems to be getting closer, a young woman is forced by a government agency to move to a home for unwed mothers and have her baby away from home in the 50s and she’s furious. It’s not a happy novel, but once you’ve read the beginning, you’re going to have to call in sick for a few days until you get to the bottom of it.
Psssst – Intrusion from Freele: Bonnie is the second person this week to recommend Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon.
Nancy Boutin – Prose Editor – The Los Angeles Review
What elements are in can’t-put-it-down prose?
It’s not the prose for me. If I’m admiring the wonderful metaphors and brilliant description, I can put the book down and pick it up again later. If I’m hooked in a story, I’m in the fictive dream. I lose track of where I am or how much time has passed. I’ve almost missed airplanes and I’ve certainly missed meals. The things that pull me into the story so completely that I later long to return to the story world are: the character has a goal I care about and want to see accomplished; I am hypnotized into the setting by sensory detail that is specific to the emotional truth of the story*, every time a story question is answered–it raises another question.
(I once read a scene in critique group where a writer knew sensory detail was important, so he put in the smell of the french fry grease and the tang of a pickle. But those experiences weren’t meaningful to the characters.)
Do you ever quit reading a novel or story before it is finished, and if so, why?
I’m very busy and I have a lot of demands on my time. If I can put a book down, I probably will and it is unlikely I will get around to picking it up again. I’ll put it down if I don’t believe the characters are real, or if they behave in ways I don’t think are true to that character. Questions and curiosity of what will happen next, or will the character advance his/her agenda, or will the perceived threat come to fruition?
Is there a secret to keeping a reader on the edge of his or her seat?
Make her care about the story goal or a character, or, even better, healing of the character’s wound. Keep questions coming up so there is never a dead spot.
Davin Malasarn – Author of “Red Man, Blue Man” – LAR Contributor Fall 2009
In your LAR story, “Red Man, Blue Man,” what elements did you use to keep the reader reading?
The opening images of this story set up a bizarre situation of two savages working as lawyers. As I progressed through the story, I kept this in mind and worked to balance the bizarre with details that seemed real and almost mundane. I felt that this switching back and forth between the strange and the ordinary kept the story surprising and interesting.
What is the title/author of a short story or novel that you just couldn’t put down?
The author I’ve recently discovered is Kazuo Ishiguro. The first book I read of his was Never Let Me Go. I then read Remains of the Day. I love how Ishiguro creates emotion out of such seemingly insignificant details. He’s taught me how the accumulation of subtle detail can really build up to great emotional power.
Joe Ponepinto – Book Reviews Editor – Los Angeles Review
What elements are in can’t-put-it-down prose?
A sense of immediacy helps get things started for me, which links back to the idea of in medias res. By beginning a story in the middle of a tense moment, the author makes the reader curious about how the situation came to be and what will happen next, allowing him/her to develop the story in several directions. And this begins to make the reader care about the characters. Then the writing must be maintained by a story and theme about something that matters (to me, of course). That keeps the tension building. Too many times I read great beginnings, only to have the story bog down in backstory or filler scenes that don’t drive the narrative forward. (Which is part of my answer to #2) Keep raising the stakes. Make sure the scenes contribute to the eventual outcome.
Do you ever quit reading a novel or story before it is finished, and if so, why?
More times than I care to admit. Usually it’s because I haven’t developed any empathy for the protagonist, and that comes from either a lack of understanding the protagonist’s desires, or his/her value system (which seems related if you ask me). When it comes to established authors, I’ll admit, this is largely personal preference. With beginning writers (I read hundreds of short story submissions, btw, so I have some experience here), I find the problem is often just one of effort. The writer hasn’t given him/herself enough time to let the story develop fully, and has been satisfied with a first or second draft.
Greg Gerke – LAR Contributor “Shampoo For Bob” – Spring 2010
What is essential in fiction to create narrative tension?
I think I would have used to say story or character. But now I would say those and ‘sentences.’ The sentence is the unit of information that conveys the story and it has to be interesting, it has to be daring and curvy and grab the reader. Something as simple as, “Call me Ishmael,” carries such a weight.
In this particular story, “Shampoo For Bob” what elements did you use to keep the reader reading?
I started with the hostage situation already in progress. I didn’t want to go into back story too much, until the middle. I thought that if I put an ordinary couple in an extraordinary situation, there would be interest from the start. But then I wanted to have fun with it because the melodramatics of the situation have been explored so many times. I guess it’s how Stanley Kubrick looked at the subject of nuclear war- Dr. Strangelove. It was so horrible that the only way he could wrestle with it was through comedy.
What is the title/author of a short story or novel that you just couldn’t put down?
I would have to say Jose Saramago’s Blindness. The elder statesmen who died a few weeks ago wrote a book about most everyone in country going blind. The premise is so startling, interest is almost implicit. I usually read very slowly, but I read 100 pages in a day (the middle hundred in the book) because what Saramago describes taking place in the buildings where the blind are kept is so unjust and horrifying that I had to keep reading on in order to find some hope and justice. And there was.