Ready for an emotion-packed, high-drama read? Introducing one of my dearest friends, Cheri Lasota, author of the turbulent fantasy, Artemis Rising. One of her gifts is sharing her vast knowledge about writing with others, which I am thrilled to pass on to you.

Every comment left, whether via twitter, facebook, or within my comment section, will be entered into a drawing for a free e-publication of Artemis Rising. For additional information about my guest author, check out her website at www.cherilasota.com.

Don’t be such a drama queen…Actually, please do: How to put the drama back into your chapters

writing craft advice by Cheri Lasota

I won’t mince words. My novel, Artemis Rising, was a pain in the butt to write. Took me ten tortuous years to whip that finicky diva into shape. Essentially, the plot involves three intertwining stories: my main plot, which focuses on a young Azorean girl choosing between two boys and two faiths (poor girl); the myth of Alpheus and Arethusa, and the legend of Tristan and Isolde. Somehow all these seemingly disparate stories flow as one in the novel (don’t ask me how…that’s where the ten years come in).

That said, the lovely Janie Bill has asked me to talk a little bit about how I created a sense of drama in a scene that inherently doesn’t have a lot of forward motion. I’ve chosen the chapter that focuses on the Azorean religious festival Festa do Espírito Santo. For years, this chapter plagued me, and yet I couldn’t bear to cut it. The festival was one of the cultural aspects of the Azores Islands that I wanted to highlight and work into my plot.

Seems like it would be easy to do, right? I can just put my main character front and center in the middle of the festival and build my scene from there.

“The orphans would dance the Chamarrita and São Macaio and Arethusa herself would be named a special queen due to her bravery and hardship.”

See? I did that. But basically the scene then consisted of my main character being the queen of the festival and performing certain rituals in a very solemn mass and procession. Not exactly edge-of-your-seat action.

Well, at some point, I had a colossal breakthrough moment. There was a powerful scene that I had deleted from chapter one (because it divulged something shocking about my bad guy that I didn’t want revealed so early on). It had lingered quietly in my periphery for a couple of years. And then! I realized I could just dump that scene into the middle of my festa chapter and that would completely throw a wrench in the seemingly benign flow of the festival.

There are my characters, dancing away toward the end of the festival, and then here is the moment where the shocking news is revealed…

“The horror in her face made him let go but not before Irmã Fátima caught sight of them and began her walk across the courtyard. But Arethusa did not think of the nun. She grasped her throat and pointed an accusing finger at Diogo, but the words she ached to say would not come.

It was you.

Amusement tugged at the corners of his mouth and his eyes spoke of secrets they both knew, secrets she had no voice to tell. On his lips, she recognized the distinct curve of his malice. The memory came back to her in a flood-rush.”

Every chapter needs:

• A beginning, middle, and end
• Rising action
• A purpose—either character development or plot movement (preferably both)

This chapter had a purpose: to highlight a critical element of Azorean culture and to give my character (and the reader) a reprieve from a horrific experience in the previous chapter. But it was missing a rising action to a big ending. This huge reveal (it’s actually my character having a flashback to that earlier scene from chapter one) gave me both of those necessary items.

This is something each writer needs to analyze. One edit of your novel should be devoted to holistic examination of chapter structure. Does each chapter pull it’s weight and add something new to the story–information, character development, plot reversals, calls to action, etc.? Do the chapters end on a cliffhanger or big reveal? If a chapter doesn’t build to something, you might need to restructure it so that it does.

And of course this isn’t just for whole chapters. This goes down to scenes within chapters and paragraphs within scenes. Every element that goes into a novel is a microcosm unto itself. And each requires the writer’s attention to ensure it’s being useful and pulling its weight.

Create and sustain drama through classic chapter structure and you’ll be sure to keep your readers on the edge of their seats. Case in point: I was sitting next to my friend as she read this revised scene. When it came to the moment of the big reveal, she turned to me eyes-wide and nearly shouted, “Oh, no you didn’t!” That put a huge smile on my face, as you can imagine. At last, I had fixed the problem of my wayward chapter: drama.