As if in slow motion…
The next time those
words pop into your head—stop writing. Here are some ways to slow down the pace
of a novel without resorting to that tired phrase.
1) Increase the level of
your detail. In the constant balance between plot
and scene, the greater the detail of the scene, the slower the pace of the
novel.
2) Go back in time before
the current event. Bullet is about to hit the character
and he reflects on the misstep that brought him to that point in time.
3) Go forward beyond the
moment. I would one day look back on that moment and
remember the prayer I uttered when I heard the gun fire its bullet. I would say…
4) Uncertainty.
I can’t remember if I heard the explosion of the bullet in the gun’s chamber
before I felt the heat of the lead in my gut…
5) Step by step
description. The blood drained away from the crease
in his knuckle—the pressure of his finger on the trigger reaching that all
important point when the hand and mind gave way to the mechanics of the gun…
6) Questions.
Would it hurt? Would I even feel the bullet enter my body? Or would it be like the
doctors on all of those old movies say, “he didn’t feel a thing.”
7) Use Latinate instead of
Anglo-Saxon words. Capacious, commodious and erudite
expressions slow down pace.
8) Stop time and reflect.
I could not see the bullet on its path, but I knew that my time to die had come.
I knew it as surely as I had ever known anything in my life.
9) Make sentences
complicated and diverse in structure.
10) Word choice. Lazy
or tentative words will bring that pace to the reader.
11) Paragraph length.
Longer paragraphs equal slower pace.
12) Use of comparisons. The similes and
metaphors and other analogies tend to slow pace.
13) Direct action vs.
summary. This is somewhat duplicative of #5, but
the more description of the action, (and by extension, less summary) the slower
the pace.
If you have any other
tip to slow down the pace of writing, please leave a comment!
