I’m reading A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life, by George Saunders, author of Lincoln in the Bardo. In this must-have reference work, Saunders asks a key question and answers it. “Why do we keep reading a story? Because we want to. Why do we want to? We read a bit of text and an expectation arises. We could understand a story as simply a series of such expectation/resolution moments.” What Saunders is saying isn’t rocket science, but it takes work to achieve these results. One way to do that is to raise the reader’s expectation in every scene.
Scenes are the building blocks of story, and there are almost as many types of scenes as there are scenes. These include to provide backstory, a beginning, characterization, a complication, description, dialogue, an ending, a foreshadow of a coming complication, plot movement, a reversal, setting, or a transition. Great scenes serve more than one purpose. One might even say that if a scene doesn’t have a purpose, it shouldn’t be there. And one thing every scene must accomplish is to cause the reader to expect something and at some point to provide it.
This doesn’t mean every scene should be like a holiday gift box, nicely filled and neatly tied with a bow. What it does mean is that when the writer sets a scene, she literally sets the reader up to expect something. Here’s an example:
- Two people who were once lovers meet after many years. Will they fall in love again? Are they free to do so? If not, will they succumb anyway? That’s the initial setting of the scene. Add to this context and stakes. The lovers are married to other people, people they love and care for and with whom they have built a life, a home, a family. Will they risk all for a moment or more than a moment? If so, what would prompt such a decision?
It's getting at the why of a scene that makes it plausible, relatable and viable. By setting a scene like the one above, the writer sets the reader up to expect an outcome. Whether the reader can guess the result or not, it’s the working out of the resolution that makes the reader keep reading. One way to do this is to add an element of discovery to the scene, thus to the story.
- In this case, the lovers meet, decide to act on their feelings and learn—what? What will the lovers learn that will give the story depth and memorability?
The answer could be as simple as you can’t go home again. Or it could be the realization that the two lovers are still deeply in love with each other and made a tragic mistake getting involved with other people, people they care for but are not the right match for them and never were. It’s the reunion that spotlights this reality. Thus begins the next exploration. What will the lovers do now that they realize the truth? Thus, the expectation/resolution cycle continues.
Still, it’s possible to get the cycle wrong. One common mistake is when the writer contrives a scene primarily as a way to get from Point A to Point B. Instead, the writer must approach each scene and each aspect of the scene organically, in a way that feels both inevitable and innovative. How can the writer achieve both?
Here are four key questions to ask:
- What is each lover afraid will happen if they act on their feelings?
- What is each afraid to discover?
- What is each afraid will happen if they don’t act on what they feel?
- What do they fear discovering then?
To make the most of those questions, also answer why for each.
Of the four questions, perhaps the most important is: What is the writer afraid will happen to these people, their families and lives, and the overall story if such a decision is made?
The underlying impetus for each question is fear. This doesn’t mean every story must be a psychological thriller. Rather, it means that fear puts its finger on the pulse of the beating heart of the characters and their stories. Tell me what you’re afraid of, and I’ll tell you what matters most to you. We ask “fear” questions to get at the emotions and longings that often lie buried because we fear what will happen if we let them out. It's this approach, the churn and roil of story, that moves the story forward by discovery, among the characters and within the writer.
Tip: Watch for scenes that are too much alike. In this situation, select the more important scene, not necessarily the most well-written, but the one that best reveals the heart of the story and the characters in it.
Reference
A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life, by George Saunders
Happy writing!
Adele Annesi’s novel of autofiction and cultural heritage is What She Takes Away (Bordighera Press, 2023). She co-authored Now What? The Creative Writer's Guide to Success After the MFA and was managing editor of Southern Literary Review. Her MFA in creative writing is from Fairfield University, and her podcast is Adele Annesi on Writing.