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The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle of Surprise
A portion of this post was originally part of the Tension, Suspense and Surprise series.
In science, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle states, basically, that if you know an object’s momentum, you cannot know its precise location at the exact same time. And to apply this principle in writing . . . okay, I’m pretty much just stealing the name because of the word “Uncertainty.”
Uncertainty doesn’t sound like something we want in our fiction, unless we’re going for experimental or highly literary works. But I think that uncertainty—and its cousin, surprise—are a vital part of a work in any genre.
Uncertainty is what keeps people reading. We have to know if the hero and heroine will get together, or if they’ll defeat the bad guys, etc. The principle actually comes straight from real life (and neuroscience):
Livia Blackburne posted a fascinating study on uncertainty in romance: when college-aged women were shown profiles of men who’d seen and rated the women’s profiles, the women were most attracted to the men when they were not told whether the men had rated them average or highly.
The uncertainty made all the difference—the women who were told the men (imaginary, by the way) rated them highly were interested, but not as much as the uncertain women. The uncertain women also reported thinking about the men more often.
For a writer, uncertainty is a powerful tool, and not just in romance. The uncertainty in any story question is a major factor in keeping people reading, and the question of a developing relationship is the biggest draw in a romance (which, it should be noted, is heavily read by women, of course).
I think part of the reason why that uncertainty is so appealing is that the outcome is something we might not expect. While it’s definitely possible to build the uncertainty around something we’re pretty sure will happen (romance and mysteries generally only have one option for a successful ending, and there’s uncertainty throughout), it’s important to remember that a jolt of something unpredictable is vital for a fresh read.
Or, as Arthur Plotnik says in Spunk & Bite: A Writer’s Guide to Bold, Contemporary Style:
Scientists have identified a patch of the forebrain called the nucleus accumbens as a center of pleasure in humans. Imaging shows heightened activity in this area of the brain when people receive a reward—whether sugar treats, money, or drugs. . . .
Unpredictable stimuli excite the nucleus accumbens, while expected stimuli elicit no response. In the experiment that led to this conclusion, researchers Gregory Bruns (Emory University) and E. Read Montague (Baylor College of Medicine) administered squirts of Kool-Aid and plain water to human test subjects in either predictable (alternating) or random patterns. Pleasure-wise, random squirts won it all.
A fresh locution may not be quite the same as Kool-Aid, but writers can extrapolate from the experiment’s conclusion: Brains love that little squirt of surprise. (12)
Uncertainty, and the tension and suspense that come from it, and unexpectedness are both really important in a novel. When you’ve got a huge event coming in your novel you have two choices. You can lead up to it with a lot of anticipation, promises, foreshadowing and/or dramatic irony—building suspense, making it uncertain whether it will happen, generally getting readers anxious. Or you can throw your readers for a loop and just drop it on them (though at least a little foreshadowing is usually good here—hence the spectrum).
Alfred Hitchcock has famously explained the difference (emphasis added):
There is a distinct difference between ‘suspense’ and ‘surprise’, and yet many pictures continually confuse the two. I’ll explain what I mean.
We are now having a very innocent little chat. Let us suppose that there is a bomb underneath this table between us. Nothing happens, and then all of a sudden, ‘Boom!’ There is an explosion. The public is surprised, but prior to this surprise, it has seen an absolutely ordinary scene, of no special consequence. Now, let us take a suspense situation. The bomb is underneath the table, and the public knows it, probably because they have seen the anarchist place it there. The public is aware that the bomb is going to explode at one o’clock and there is a clock in the décor. The public can see that it is a quarter to one. In these conditions this same innocuous conversation becomes fascinating because the public is participating in the scene.
The audience is longing to warn the characters on the screen: ‘You shouldn’t be talking about such trivial matters. There’s a bomb underneath you and it’s about to explode!’
In the first case we have given the public fifteen seconds of surprise at the moment of the explosion. In the second case we have provided them with fifteen minutes of suspense. The conclusion is that whenever possible the public must be informed. Except when the surprise is a twist, that is, when the unexpected ending is, in itself, the highlight of the story.
—Hitchcock by François Truffaut, p 79-80, as quoted by senses of cinema
Not to disagree with my good friend Alfred, but both surprise and suspense are important. For major events and big promises, suspense is generally better. But for smaller events—especially things that don’t need the extra explaining and won’t live up to the level of suspense—surprise is a great thing.
If we lead up to all the events in a story, we run the risk of being too predictable. If we lead up to none of them, our readers are more likely to experience PTSD than suspense. One is probably better for your event and your story.
How do you determine whether your event should be a surprise or be used to create suspense? Hitchcock’s guideline is a starting place: if it’s a twist ending, surprise is pretty dang important. On the other hand, if that surprise would heighten the suspense throughout the book (without dragging it out too much) and if you can set it up for the audience to know without informing the characters, you could think about whether you could use the extra layer of suspense.
Conversely, consider whether you spend too long building up to minor events—what if you cut all the foreshadowing? Would the reader be slighted or delighted when the surprise is sprung?
What do you think? How do you decide whether an event will be used for suspense or surprise?
Photo by Invizible Man
Personal, timely stakes for suspense and immediacy
One of my writing friends, Marnee, is working on digging deeper and raising the stakes on her WIP. I loved the way she described this:
I wanted all my characters to have a stake in the outcome of their actions. And, I wanted that “stake” to be something immediate. It couldn’t be something without a timeframe. My hero only has a certain time to catch the villain because once the villain realizes he’s on to him, he’ll disappear and my hero will lose his chance. My heroine needs to take the “job” my hero has offered because she needs the money—fast. My villain can’t run and hide even when he’s foiled because of . . . well, something I haven’t figured out yet.
Their needs have to be immediate and volatile and in complete opposition. And they have to be completely invested. No turning back.
I like the combination of personal stakes and a deadline—a great way to create suspense and immediacy, as Marnee points out.
I also like that she’s taking the time to do this for the villain (even if she hasn’t gotten the answer yet). “To be evil” is not a sufficient motivation for the villain’s heinous action. We want our villains to be rounded characters with believable motivations, not just amorphous evil that our hero’s got to defeat. They have to have a dog in this fight or they’ll cash in their chips and go home. So why this person? Why this (despicable) action? It could be something as simple as money—but there are lots of ways to make money. Why this way?
What do you think? How do you do this in your works?
Photo by Dayna Mason
Posted in Technique
Tagged raising stakes, stakes, suspense, suspense fix, tension, tension fix
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Guest posting today
I have a guest post today at Jagi Lamplighter’s blog. I’m writing about using something that doesn’t even matter to increase the suspense in your story.
Suspense on a story level and tension on a scene level are both vital to creating a readable story. Tension compels readers to read a scene, while suspense keeps them hooked until the next scene. There are many things we can do to heighten and highlight the tension in our writing. One technique that has been used to great effect is to use something that doesn’t matter at all, something that the reader doesn’t care about.
And welcome to any visitors clicking through from Jagi’s blog! To read more about tension and suspense, check out the blog series. And tomorrow, we’ll be back to our current blog series on backstory.
Why suspense?
Why are suspense, tension and surprise all so important? We’ve established that suspense and tension draw the readers along through your story, and compel them to keep reading. But it’s more than just making readers read, and rewarding them (with surprise sometimes)—it’s making them want to read your book (and your next one).
James Scott Bell highlights one reason why these elements are so important: “Modulating tension is one of the keys to writing fiction” (Revision And Self-Editing, 82). We started off our series with a quote from agent Noah Lukeman: “Suspense, more than any other element, affects the immediate, short term experience of the work” (The Plot Thickens, 119).
But Lukeman further explains why being conscious of tension and suspense are so important:
The presence of suspense is . . . a feat and shows promise, since it indicates that the writer is writing more for the reader than for himself. (120)
I think it’s easy—and for many of us, important—to draft for ourselves. I’m told Stephen King says you should write the first draft “with the door closed”—with little to no input or interference from others, so that you can get out the story you’re trying to tell. Remember the delight, the way you relish the scenes that you’ve been waiting for your whole book long?
But when we’re ready to open that door, to share your writing with an eye to improving it, it’s not about what you loved writing and what you still love reading anymore. It’s about what someone else—an agent, an editor, a customer in a bookstore—will love reading, what will suck them in and drag them on a relentless, compelling journey with your characters. Focusing on the experience of your readers shows that you’re not just in it to entertain yourself and a few friends—you’re here to tell a story, to get people reading—to entertain.
What do you think? Why are suspense, tension and surprise so important?
Photo credit: Aart von Bezooyen
Any final words (on suspense)?
Well, we’re winding down the series on suspense, tension and surprise. We’ve looked into assessing our stories, ratcheting up the tension and increasing the suspense. We’ve used lots and lots of resources (the most I have for any series), and I’ve talked a lot about things I’ve found in 
looking at my own work.
But, man, that still seems a little one-sided. I’d hate to leave you in suspense over your greatest suspense, tension or surprise issues—and I’d hate for all of us to miss out on the things you‘ve found to make your work better in these areas.
So, do you have any other questions or fixes on suspense, tension or surprise? (Comments and questions here may get “promoted” into posts of their own, so ask or share away—and be sure to put your link in the URL box!)
Photo credits: question—Svilen Mushkatov
Suspense fix: Raise the stakes
Although I came across this advice over and over again, I hadn’t planned to include it. I thought it was already covered in the 37 ways to build tension and suspense, and I didn’t want to just list those again. But just mentioning “raise the stakes” probably isn’t quite enough for how important this technique is.
Quite simply, if the stakes aren’t high enough in your book, other fixes may not be able to compensate. If Grandmama’s prized teacup poodle is the only one who’s going to 
suffer if the bad guys win, other attempts at suspense and tension may seem forced. (Is Butch really going to pull a gun over Gigi?)
Donald Maass (Writing the Breakout Novel, 59-80) and Noah Lukeman (The Plot Thickens, 121-123) both specifically point to raising the stakes. In the suspense structure we looked at earlier, establishing the stakes was a crucial goal of Act I, as was raising them in Act II.
So, how do we do that? Maass gives a few ways: establish a high value on human life (especially if this hero[ine] is going to have to kill), and create public and private stakes—ways in which the public at large and the characters on a personal level will suffer if they lose. In Revision And Self-Editing, James Scott Bell also gives specific ways to raise those stakes:
- Plot stakes: brainstorm new ways things might go wrong for your Lead—and push yourself. Go crazy; there are no bad ideas. Come up with at least 6 ideas.
- Character stakes [Maass's personal stakes]: put the character into a dilemma. Stick him between a rock and a hard place and make him choose. List all the reasons why he must take option B and why he shouldn’t take option A—even though he needs to (and will) take option A. And/or make it personal—threaten or hurt the Lead, or better yet, someone they care about.
- Societal stakes [Maass's public stakes]: How might society be hurt if things go wrong? How can you show that, on a small scale or through extrapolation? (231-233).
Finally, Noah Lukeman points out that even seemingly small events can have big personal stakes—he uses the example of getting the trash to the garbage truck in time. Not a major stressor for most of us, but if you’ve forgotten for the last three weeks, and your landlady’s going to evict you if you don’t get that garbage out of your place, suddenly it matters.
So give Gigi a rest.
What do you think? How else can you raise the stakes?
Posted in Technique
Tagged poodles, raising stakes, stakes, suspense, suspense fix, tension, tension fix
4 Comments
Suspense fix: Stack promises
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Way back when, I recommended assessing your story’s suspense taking a look at the promises you were making and fulfilling. The example assessment I used (completely made up, of course) showed a list of promises made in various scenes, tracking their progress in subsequent scenes (whether they were fulfilled, delayed or denied). Just so you don’t have to click through again, here you go:
| Scene | Promise | Fulfilled |
| 7 | She’ll meet him at dawn (D)—6 | A fulfilled |
| 8 | – | C fulfilled |
| 9 | He’ll kill her (E)—10 | B delayed |
| 10 | – | D fulfilled; E denied |
We have a number of simultaneous, conflicting promises building here—a great set up for suspense. But it’s the last scene here that got me thinking. In that scene, apparently, we’re fulfilling her promise of meeting him at dawn, and obviously not fulfilling his promise to kill her. Really, this shouldn’t say that there are no promises made here—we should use the fulfillment of a promise to introduce a new, bigger promise.
Those two promises kept us in suspense, and we’ve now released that anticipation if he just decides, “Oh, I won’t kill her after all. She seems kinda nice.” The suspense level (and probably tension, too) bottoms out.
Instead of just letting it go, we can use this opportunity to add a new promise—since both of those characters have fulfilled or lost their promises, they need a new one to keep us in suspense. It doesn’t always have to come in the same scene, but it had better come pretty quick.
I’m planning to use this myself in my next round of revisions. I spend a while foreshadowing (aka promising and creating anticipation) a meeting between two characters. If they met and were glad/mad/sad to see one another, that lowers the suspense level for their storyline. That release can damage the suspense in my story—or I can channel the previous suspense into a new, related promise. Now character Z has to get character Q to do something, or his whole plan—and maybe their lives—could be in jeopardy.
What do you think? How do you stack promises to create suspense? How have you seen this in other books?
Suspense fix: Cliffhangers
As I defined the terms at the beginning of this series, tension works within a scene to keep us reading, while suspense is the “suprascenic” feature that keeps us reading after a scene closes. So sometimes, the way to keep people reading is as simple as examining how you end each scene, and especially each chapter.
I’ve made this part of the scene chart—a column where I indicate whether the scene ends on a hook, a segue or a note of closure. The “segue” means that it’s a lead-in to the next scene; the “closure” means that I wrap things up neatly for that character and situation—nothing more to see here, folks. Move along.
To build suspense, avoid the closure ending—especially at chapter breaks, where a reader is most likely to set down your story. As author Katie Ganshert said the other day, End each chapter in a state of unbalance.”
Katie also listed a number of ways to do this:
We could stop in the middle of the action. Find an enticing hook. Foreshadow things to come. . . .
Consider cutting the last paragraph. The last line. The last page. Whatever you need to do to end each chapter on a note of unbalance. A sense that things aren’t well. Make your reader’s stomach squirm and propel them to the next page so they can slay the uncomfortable beast taking root in their bellies.
Related to this is cliffhangers within a scene or chapter. In Fiction First Aid, Ray Obstfeld calls this creating a “suspense pocket” (47). You set up a promise—like someone receiving a letter from someone unknown. Rather than fulfilling the promise immediately and have the character open it right away, try throwing in an event or two that delays that fulfillment. (This can also be characterization or setup, and can make readers pay attention to what would otherwise be a boring scene.)
One caveat: change up the kind of unbalance (and length, for the suspense pocket). Katie’s advice is absolutely excellent—but if we take it to mean that all of our chapter endings come in the middle of a scene, right before a major disaster, it’s going to feel repetitive and forced. Don’t always end in the middle of a scene, or end on a line of foreshadowing worthy of Howard-Shore-John-Williams-dramatic-music-swell (Little did we know, we’d never be the same at the end of every chapter).
Really—I read a book (four, actually, in a series) that did this on every chapter it seemed, and it was so obnoxious. Not just because I couldn’t stop reading in the middle of the chapter, but because it felt like the cheap trick it was. (Every chapter ended on a “hook” all right—one that was resolved in the first paragraph of the next chapter, because it was actually still part of the same scene.) Still liked the books, of course, but I’m still annoyed about that.
What do you think? How else can you end a scene on a note of unbalance?
Photo by spaceodissey
Posted in Technique
Tagged chapter endings, cliffhangers, katie ganshert, scene, scene charts, scene structure, scene tension, suspense, suspense fix, tension
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