by Kathryn Craft

Movement is a transfer of energy. You may have learned this in high school physics, but for me, the lesson became an indelible experience in dance. I could feel energy transfer from muscle to bone, from myself to a partner. I could imagine drawing energy from the earth through my body to the top of my head and beyond; I sent it from my gut through my fingertips and into the audience so that they, too, could join in the dance.

I’ve spent the last three years exploring how story also benefits from a transfer of energy, and the most important parallel is this: the choreography that coordinates dance movement is not a series of steps any more than a story is a series of black marks on a page. What captivates is the intention the mover brings to the connection between steps, just as story movement relies on the energy between words.

One of the many benefits of this fresh perspective is that you’ll stop thinking about how to tell a damn good story. Instead, you’ll build a story that your reader can enter. Once you perceive your story’s spaces, you can invite your reader into it—and then, through managing their expectations, convince them to stay.

Here are five techniques that will extend that invitation.

1. Capitalize on sweet anticipation.

Those who read novels are drawn to the long guessing game that results when story questions are raised and their answers are delayed. They want to linger in that moment when he might or might not kiss her. To inhabit a character’s dream for a bit longer before their world comes crashing down around them. To see if the journey they were on has changed them enough to face their nearly impossible climactic dilemma.

Anticipation relies on stopping short of inserting explanation into the action-reaction chain that drives a novel. Unexpected reactions pique the reader’s curiosity. And guess what our emotions are? Energy.

As your reader asks, Why would this character act that way, picture them leaning into your story, reading on to find out. You may need to reinsert the backstory later—but if you do it will be much later, when the character is now acting against their best interests and the reader must simply know why.

2. Make use of genre expectation.

The appreciation of story is subjective and quite personal. One person might read only horror; another might read anything but. Raise the right question in your opening, though, and you’ll be able to use genre expectations to invite the right reader to move into your story.

Some genre expectations:

• Suspense: How will the protagonist prevail against the threat?
• Thriller: Will the protagonist be able to save everyone from the threat?
• Horror: Will the protagonist be able to vanquish the monster?
• Adventure: Will the protagonist succeed in his quest?
• Women’s fiction: Will personal growth lead to a fresh sense of hope?
• Fantasy: How will otherworld elements help the protagonist achieve their goal?
• Mystery: Will the protagonist be able to figure out who did it?

If a novel opens with the discovery of a dead body and a forensics team finds a disturbing clue, your reader won’t wonder if the female detective will fall in love with the victim’s brother. They’ll recognize a murder mystery in their preferred subgenre of the police procedural.

A genre question is a springboard.

Non-stop action doesn’t create story movement in thriller any more than sex automatically creates story movement in a romance. You must bait your hook with a challenging story goal for the protagonist. In the case of our detective, she may recognize an artifact at the crime scene that pertains to the disappearance of her father ten years ago, but since she’s up for a promotion, she’s loath to share this potential weakness with her male colleagues.

Now the reader is trying to imagine how this evidence will point to the killer, and whether its personal significance will compromise the detective and affect her promotion.

3. Add a watcher.

Show a character undressing for bed? Meh. We all do this every night. Show someone watching this action through a second-floor window from the street, though, and the dynamic of the scene changes. The resulting tension raises reader expectation: this will be important.

Any story with a stakeout, a stalker, paparazzi, an anonymous protector, or a nosy neighbor features a watcher. Someone standing in the wings, literally or figuratively. Ghosts are effective watchers. Santa Claus sees you when you’re sleeping. A believer would argue that God is the ultimate watcher—but even a pet’s watchful glare can raise the tension when its owner is about to lie.

4. Foreshadow.

Readers love to be knocked off-balance when an expectation isn’t met, but you must take care to create a world in which this unbalancing event could be expected to take place. Introduce a witch on page 50 and the reader might throw the book against the wall; show a flower making noise as it struggles to emerge from frozen ground and that page 50 witch won’t seem so far-fetched—in fact, her presence might meet expectation without having to explain a thing.

5. Add prose support.

If you’re anything like me, you waste too much time fiddling with phrasing in your first draft. But know that the longer you spend on phrasing, the harder it will be to replace it when you realize that those words could not create the narrative momentum you’d hoped for. The truth is, prose can’t create story movement—remember, story intention lives between the words—but prose can support it.

Turns out, your goal isn’t to tell a damn good story after all.

From the flat surface of a page, you must build a story that invites the reader in. Not once, at the opening, but again and again in every scene, by raising fresh questions that manage reader expectation.

Do so and your reader will experience a story that moves.

* * * * * *

About Kathryn

Kathryn Craft’s two-decade tenures as dancer/choreographer, dance critic, and freelance developmental editor have merged to inform the perspective about story movement featured in her October 7 release, CRAFTING STORY MOVEMENT: Techniques to Engage Readers and Drive Your Story Forward. Building on her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education, it has been her great joy to share the craft of writing by mentoring novelists, most recently through her Your Novel Year program, and by speaking at dozens of venues where people thirst to write, from writing groups, conferences, and libraries to in-patient rehabs and grief support groups. She is the award-winning author of two novels from Sourcebooks, The Art of Falling and The Far End of Happy. She lives with her husband in Doylestown, PA.

Kathryn's New Book - now on pre-order, releasing on October 7!

Some other WITS posts by Kathryn:

Where an Author's Story Begins

The Story that Holds You Back

Our Capacity for Brilliance