Creating Tension and suspense Powerpoint.ppt

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1. Narrative Writing
Creating Tension
Year 8Year 8

2. The word tense has two meanings:
1.The time in which an event takes place – past, present or future.
2.The sensation of feeling tense, which is related to tension.
•Correct use of tense is one of the most important elements of a story.
•Incorrect use of tense, or switching between the two, is one of the most
common errors made by students when writing stories.
•Most stories are set in the past tense. However, there is nothing wrong with
writing your story in the present tense. It can make a ghost story or thriller very
immediate, exciting and real.
•The rules are simple… If you start in the present tense, stay in the present tense.
If you start in the past, stay in the past.
Tense

3. Copy out the following extract, correcting any bits which you feel are in the
wrong tense.
‘Mr and Mrs Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they
are perfectly normal, thank you very much. They are the last people you’d expect
to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just don’t hold
with
such nonsense.’
Extension
‘Mr Dursley is the director of a firm called Grunnings, which made drills. He is a
big, beefy man with hardly any neck, although he does have a very large
moustache.’
Tense

4. ‘Mr and Mrs Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they
were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you’d
expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn’t
hold with
such nonsense.’
Extension
‘Mr Dursley was the director of a firm called Grunnings, which made drills. He
was a big, beefy man with hardly any neck, although he did have a very large
moustache.’
Tense - Answers

5. What is the meaning of the word tension?

1.The state of being stretched tight.
2.Mental or emotional strain.
•A good story will create tension for the reader to keep them interested and keep
the story exciting.
•What might a writer do with their words and sentences to make the reader
feel tense?
What Is Tension?

6. Read the following passage and underline any parts that you feel are increasing
tension for the reader.
Can you explain what they are?
Extract
The old, black key felt colder than any of the others. She pushed it into the
keyhole. It turned smoothly, with a satisfying clink. Coraline stopped and
listened. She knew she was doing something wrong, and she was trying to
listen for her mother coming back, but she heard nothing. Then Coraline put
her hand on the doorknob and turned it; and, finally, she opened the door.
It opened onto a dark hallway. The bricks had gone, as if they’d never been
there. There was a cold, musty smell coming through the open doorway: it
smelled like something very old and very slow.

7. Now answer the following questions about the text.
‘The old, black key felt colder than any of the others.’
1. What technique is this line using to alert the reader to possible danger?
‘Coraline stopped and listened. She knew she was doing something wrong, and
she was trying to listen for her mother coming back, but she heard nothing.’
2. There are various techniques being used here. How and why does this passage
create tension?
Questions

8. ‘Then Coraline put her hand on the doorknob and turned it; and, finally, she
opened the door.’
3. Why do you think the writer ends the paragraph here?
‘There was a cold, musty smell coming through the open doorway: it smelled like
something very old and very slow.’
4. How would you describe the technique being used here?
Questions

9. Introducing the technique, providing a short quotation and explaining its effect is
called a T.E.E. paragraph.
There follows some possible answers to the questions, laid out as P.E.E.
paragraphs.
T.E.E. stands for Technique, Evidence and Explanation.
They are not the only possible answers and yours may be better and more
interesting.
T.E.E
T.E.E

10. ‘The old, black key felt colder than any of the others.’

1. What technique is this line using to alert the reader to possible danger?
The writer uses a range of adjectives to make the key seem mysterious: old, black
and the comparative adjective colder in the adjectival phrase ‘colder than any of
the others.’
This makes the key seem particularly mysterious and makes the reader wonder
what kind of door a key like that would open and where it would take Coraline.
Possible Answers

11. ‘Coraline stopped and listened. She knew she was doing something wrong, and
she was trying to listen for her mother coming back, but she heard nothing.’
2. There are various techniques being used here. How and why does this passage
create tension?
The writer uses a short sentence, ‘Coraline stopped and listened,’ to describe
Coraline’s actions. The reader is now waiting to see what will happen next.
The next sentence is a longer, compound sentence outlining her thoughts. The
fact ‘She knew she was doing something wrong’ makes the reader nervous. While
the reader is worried that her mother may return at any moment, they may be
even more nervous that she will not!’
Notice how these answers introduce a quotation, embed it in the sentence and
then explain its effect. This is an effective way to write about a text.
Possible Answers

12. ‘Then Coraline put her hand on the doorknob and turned it; and, finally, she
opened the door.’
3. Why do you think the writer ends the paragraph here?
The writer ends the paragraph with ‘and, finally, she opened the door.’ This
means the reader has to read on to find out what is behind the door, therefore
increasing the tension.
Possible Answers

13. ‘There was a cold, musty smell coming through the open doorway: it smelled like
something very old and very slow.’
4. How would you describe the technique being used here?
This passage uses the sense of smell to make the scene vivid and scary. The
writer then uses an unusual technique: ‘it smelled like something very old and
very slow.’ It would be very difficult for the smell of something to be ‘very old and
very slow.’ This puts a creepy picture in our mind of what it might be and
increases tension for the reader.
Possible Answers

14. So, what techniques have we discovered for creating tension that we could use in
our own stories?
•Putting a character that you care about into a scary situation
•Using a range of adjectives to describe things and feelings
•Appealing to the readers’ senses
•Repetition of words and sentence structures
•Short sentences
•Single sentence paragraphs
•One word paragraphs
•Ellipsis
Plenary

15. Create
suspense
•Short sentences
•Short paragraphs
•Sentence fragments
•Repetition
•Ellipsis
•Figurative language
•Extending words with hyphens
•Block letters
•Putting a character that you care
about into a scary situation
•Using a range of adjectives to
describe things and feelings
•Appealing to the readers’ senses
(imagery)

16. Short
sentence
s
•I froze.
•I gulped.
•Everything disappeared. I was lost
•Heart pounded. Head ached. Time ticked.
•The powerful engines of the boat were
switched off. Silence. Something was
wrong.

17. Ellipsis
•Quickly, with quivering hands, widened
eyes, Sally grabbed the sharp pointed
object and gazed. It was … a knife …
with blood stains…

18. Repetitio
n
•The voice grew louder –
louder – louder.
•He looked up and scanned
the horizon. The sea was blue
and flat. No boats. No islands.
No birds. Not even a flying
fish.

19. Sentence
fragment
s
•I stood rooted to the ground.
Not breathing. Speechless. Just
listening.
•I was scared. Very scared. Very
scared indeed.
•The place was dark. Very dark.
Very dark indeed.

20. Short
paragrap
hs
As the door opened, I heard heavy
foot steps and I saw a pitch-black
shadow.
I froze.
The shadow moved towards me
and poked me.