So much of what I see in student writing in mystery and thriller is that people think it really needs to be fast paced and it’s got to fly. If it doesn’t just fly off the page then the readers are gonna drop it.
We’re worried that if our first page or two pages doesn’t grab the reader, an agent or a reader is just going to put it down and throw it away. I don’t know if this is the influence of people thinking that Patterson does it so everyone’s got to do it, but a lot of it is this feeling that it’s just got to fly.
In your head vs. on the page
One of the dangers for all writers is that the story winds up being more in your head than on the page. For beginning students this happens all the time, just because getting it really down onto the page takes a lot of iteration. Showing it to readers in a workshop, having them tell you what’s there, finding out what’s on the page and what’s not.
As writers we can never get away. Unless we put it in a drawer for three months, we can’t really get away from part of it being in our head and part of it being on the page. So readers are really helpful to show us what’s getting down on the page.
The importance of slowing down
The big thing is, initially that real drive to have the story go so fast because it’s a mystery or a thriller winds up making it so that there’s not enough on the page for the reader to understand the basic premise points or the givens. When that happens, that’s what makes readers tune out.
Actually, the reverse is true. If you slow things down and really start to dramatize it for the reader, then the reader actually wants to start reading faster and turning pages. That’s exactly what you want – that reader experience of, “Oh my god, I want to keep reading, I want to turn pages faster!”
When you’re able to really engage with intrigue and suspense there, and keep it exciting and interesting, slowing down actually makes the reader lean in and go faster. So that’s what we’re going to push towards.
