One of the big challenges I have in my writing…heck, why use that euphemism?… I’ve got a problem, a serious problem, a deal-breaker-for-a-reader problem: I don’t yet know how to create suspense well and I want my book to be page-turner.

Recently, though, I’ve found a few small clues that I may be able to use toward solving this problem in my work. I read a knocked-my-socks-off, non-fiction, children’s/young adult book about the history of the atom bomb. It’s riveting. No kidding. It had me on page one of the introduction. And I’m not the only one who’s terribly impressed with it, I know, because it won a Newbery Honor Award in 2013.

After I got a ways into it, I said to myself, ‘There’s something important to learn here, my dear.’ I started to notice how the author kept me turning the pages, kept me unable to leave the dining table where I’d propped up the book beside my plate. The author just kept dropping phrases that made me say, ‘And then what happened?’

The book I’m talking about is Steve Sheinkin’s Bomb: The Race to Build—and Steal—the World’s Most Dangerous Weapon (Roaring Brook Press, 2012).

Before I go further, let me say there are many useful resources on the internet about how to build suspense, for example, http://www.writersdigest.com/qp7-migration-conferencesevents/nine-tricks-to-writing-suspense-fiction. These generally speak of overarching structural elements related to plot and sequencing—characters in peril, high stakes, time pressure & deadlines, dilemmas, complications, villainous villains, dramatic promises and questions, danger, and so forth.

What I need—as my plot-line and character arcs are established and I’m in my sixth manuscript revision —is to learn to make small refinements that can, I hope, take me from novice writer to professional author. I’m looking for those little touches that create momentum, generate tension, that leave a reader deciding at the end a chapter to read for just fifteen more minutes. I need those “drip-drip-drip” phrases or sentences or questions that send a reader pell-mell down the story line, breathless for an answer. (See http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/08/a-simple-way-to-create-suspense/?_r=0).

So I started a list of phrases that Steve Sheinkin used to build anticipation and apprehension, to foreshadow, to hook, to worry me. Then in reading a number other titles from my long list of MG/YA books I want to read (Amy Timberline’s One Came Home—a 2014 Newbery Honor book, and Ester Wier’s The Loner—a 1964 Newbery Honor book) I continued compiling the list for a several days. I’ve changed them a bit, but here’s what I culled from Steve’s book and the others. Of course, there’s no end to such a list, but like a thesaurus, it may kick-start inspiration for me and perhaps for other earnest writers:

… X would get her wish, and more….

what they didn’t know….

she was about to…

the message was clear—if…then…

silence….is evidence…

X knew better than to question…

there had been X… but now Y…

it was time for action/decision…but…

he’d heard…but was not impressed…

X condition…had to end

no one cared except…

but there was one problem…

X didn’t sound right…

meanwhile…

no matter the risk…

had no way of knowing…but

the perfect opportunity slipped….

chose not to…a decision that would…

disappearing into….

think it over…let me know…

had to…next task

I am not permitted to tell you…

be part of history…

set for the most important…

inspite of X…Y

one final …

now, at least…

slipped unnoticed…

only later did she learn…

you have X hours to…

wouldn’t have guessed…

about to walk into…

needs all the help…

strange phone call….strange voice…

mystery intensified

What was happening?

in one pocket was …in another was…

he noticed the man in …X place

they were still…but

the question remained…how close…

one X over, another beginning…

the next big question…

I should have known….

X’s memories pressed….

the last conversation …came to mind…

it did not get better…

where was I going to get ….

the plan was…

there’s a storm coming…you should…

the smell of …I thought of the day….

X had corrupted Y…it began

long ago, X made up his mind to….

it was the first time in his life he X…

after that, she wouldn’t have to worry…

nobody had told me not to…

X had no way of knowing…

It’ll happen…the right thing will happen…

Well, that’s what I’m hoping!