Episode 130: Conflict & Suspense by James Scott Bell

Notes:

Fable references a quote by director Alfred Hitchcock. Here is that quote

“What is drama but life with the dull bits cut out.”

The book that Fable references that discusses “tension on every page” is “Writing the Breakout Novel” by Donald Maass.

The Verbivore references a Seinfeld TV series quote that James Scott Bell includes in his book to help make a point about choosing interesting elements that also fit within your story. Here is that quote:

“I don't think you do. You see, you know how to *take* the reservation, you just don't know how to *hold* the reservation. And that's really the most important part of the reservation: the holding. Anybody can just take them.”

The Verbivore references the “Elements of Fiction Writing” series of books that is connected with WritersDigest.com. We often reference the articles on this website as part of our writing discussions. Here is a link to the list of books in this series: https://www.goodreads.com/series/67685-elements-of-fiction-writing

In case you’re interested, we’ve done several past episodes that look at the craft of writing from a varity of lenses. Here are those episodes:

Episode 103: The Creative Doer

Episode 79: Let's talk about craft books

Episode 78: Let's talk about The War of Art

Books & Movies Mentioned:

Elements of Fiction Writing: Conflict and Suspense by James Scott Bell

The Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr. and E. B. White

Seinfeld Complete TV Series

Rope – Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

How to Write Dazzling Dialogue: The Fastest Way to Improve Any Manuscript (Bell on Writing) by James Scott Bell

Plot & Structure: Techniques and Exercises for Crafting a Plot That Grips Readers from Start to Finish by James Scott Bell

Music from: https://filmmusic.io
’Friendly day’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com)
Licence: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)