Page-Turning Energy: Keeping Readers Curious
"Page-turning energy": It's not just for thrillers. Every successful narrative gives readers reasons to keep reading. But how does PTE actually happen? Learn how to keep the pages turning in your own work-in-progress.
Annie Mydla, Managing Editor
Authors can treat the idea of "page-turning energy" as though it were a mythological force. We don't know where it comes from! We can only pray for it to grace our pages with its presence.
To this I say: poppycock. There are many concrete strategies for building PTE. No divine visitation required. (Granted, we ain't saying "Scram" if the gods do show up!)
Until then, though, DIY PTE!
Get it into your WIP!
I find it practical to talk about two main sources of page-turning energy. Questions make readers keep reading to get answers. Pleasurability gives readers something they'll keep reading to get more of. Building both into a manuscript creates unstoppable PTE.
Part 1: Questions
Human curiosity is one of the strongest forces on earth. So while you're coming up with the "A to Z" of your plot arc, don't forget that the way in which you tell the story can raise just as much moment-to-moment interest as the events themselves. Plant questions in the text for readers to wonder about and watch your PTE soar.
Plot questions are a fundamental and well-known source of PTE, but authors can get so focused on sharing their story with readers that they forget to build questions into the telling. Is your book making readers curious about what will happen next? Or, if you've already given them expectations about what happens, are they curious about how it will be?
Character questions are also key to many stories, but again, authors can be so excited to get readers acquainted with everything about their characters that they forget to make readers curious. Is your book simply telling readers about the characters, or trying to get readers to actively want to know more about them? Are you relying too much on the assumption that readers should be as interested in your characters as you are? Are you putting in the work to raise the kinds of questions in readers' minds that will make them curious?
Interpersonal relationship questions can happen on a large scale ("Will Miranda and Joan get back together?") and a small scale ("How will this young girl respond now that the older woman has told her she shouldn't be smoking?") Want more PTE? Don't settle for simply portraying your characters' relationships from all angles right away—for example, with too much first-person commentary, reported thought, third-person context, or expository dialogue. Let scenes play out in ways that give readers specific questions for the text to answer later.
Foreshadowing is a form of question because it makes readers wonder why they feel something is going to happen. The question of how to create foreshadowing can feel as nebulous as PTE itself for early-career authors, but as with PTE itself, it's mechanical, not mystical. All you have to do is put an event from later in the book earlier in the book in a slightly different form. This article from My Story Doctor gives examples.
Structural questions come from an author's decisions about what information to reveal and when. Early-career authors, especially, are prone to revealing too much too soon, reducing PTE. Imagine an exposition in which we learn, "Sarah hadn't been outside in ten years because of anxiety from childhood trauma". Okay—story told. No need to read further. But now imagine a version that creates questions: "Sarah was nervous about being in full sunlight. What should she wear? She'd long since outgrown the coats and shoes she'd used back then." The second version raises questions about why Sarah hadn't been outside in so long, exactly how long it's been, and what happened to make her stay inside. Readers need to keep reading if they want to learn why. PTE!
Moral, social, and political questions are a great source of PTE that can work in the background or foreground of a narrative. In the background: imagine a story about a teacher whose marriage is falling apart. Now imagine a story about a teacher whose marriage is falling apart at the same time as major layoffs are happening in their school district. The "A" plotline about the marriage gets extra PTE from the questions raised by the "B" plotline as readers ask, "How will the layoffs complicate the marriage?" In the foreground: A book about an older woman trying to get her kids back from foster care may have tension enhanced if it's shown that court officials pay less attention to her than a male counterpart or a younger women. Readers are guided to ask, "How will the court officials' sexism effect the plot and the character's goals?"
Thematic questions can crank up the PTE like almost nothing else, but I find them under-utilized by early-career authors. I once worked on a book where the main plotline had the protagonist cheating on academic work. PTE was low, and one of the reasons was that the author was relying on readers' personal perceptions of cheating to make them curious about the outcome rather than building the context and significance of cheating into the world of the book. I dislike cheating, but I felt much less invested in the "What's going to happen" question than I might have if the book had beefed up the themes.
For example, if the book had had a theme that too-strict punishments creates more of what it seeks to prevent, perhaps by having cheating be punishable by death in the world of the book, I'd have asked, "Oh my gosh, how is the protagonist going to escape such an over-the-top fate in this extreme society?" On the other side, if the book had built up a theme that hard work is the only real path to success, for example, by showing secondary characters in the society regretting cheating on a purely moral basis, I'd have asked, "Oh no, will the protagonist ever grow as a person enough to make amends for what they did?" Either approach would have resulted in more PTE—and more dependable PTE for a wider audience—than leaving readers to interpret the protagonist's arc based on their personal thoughts about cheating.
Questions raised by the angle of the story can create a huge amount of PTE even before the book starts. For example, I've seen so many stories about lovers in Pompeii that my eyes start to glaze over if I find one in the North Street Book Prize entry pool. But what about if the day were narrated from the perspective of a five-year-old child? I'm paying a lot more attention. "Wow, Pompeii from the POV of a child? What the heck is that going to be like?" The PTE is building before I've read a single page.
Craft questions can raise PTE for readers who are also writers themselves or have craft experience with books for other reasons. If the craft is good in the beginning of the book, the reader might get curious about how it will develop later: "I wonder how this B plot is going to influence the A plot going into the climax"; "I love this genre blend between corporate espionage, steampunk, and horror. Can't wait to find out how the blend affects each character's design and purpose!" Authors who plan on entering literary contests can sometimes make their book stand out in the submissions pool by planting craft questions for the judges to get excited about.
Make sure the questions are the right questions. The questions that build PTE are those that feed into the book's main plot and themes in other ways. Raising questions about things that don't matter in the bigger picture dilutes PTE.
Similarly, remember to answer the questions eventually so readers can get the satisfaction they were promised. A question that builds PTE early can kill it later if abandoned. Don't provide the answers too quickly, though! That can make readers feel cheated of the wonderful PTE feeling.
Part 2: Pleasurability
Questions build PTE by giving readers a promise about what's coming. When the reader gets curious, it's like the book has handed them a rubber band that pulls them into the later chapters. Pleasurability is more like giving them the reader a delicious piece of food they can't stop eating. They turn the page to get another delectable bite.
Identification pleasure is one of the strongest PTE generators ever. Making readers relate to the characters, plot, themes, setting, and references allows them to feel seen, understood, and catered to in a way that rarely happens in real life. That's why it's so very crucial to know your target audience. If you can give them an experience that speaks directly to them, the PTE will be so strong that they'll be sad when they run out of pages. Bonus if your book can reach the secret parts of them they don't tell anyone else about, and/or can manipulate whatever's inside them to make them feel satisfyingly different by the end of the book.
Another PTE boost can come from giving readers a pleasurable emotional, psychological, or intellectual experience. Specifics depend on the target audience. Books designed for a concentrated emotional effect might produce inspiration, joy, excitement, suspense, horror, or even outrage. Psychological or intellectual pleasure can come when readers feel like they're learning, connecting the dots, or deciphering subtext. Most books will combine more than one effect in any given moment.
Physical pleasure is a third mighty source of PTE. A book might make readers feel relaxed, cause them to laugh, inspire physical fear, galvanize and motivate them, or, in the case of romance writing, turn them on. One incredibly important yet underdiscussed source of physical PTE is pacing. Virtually all readers subconsciously crave a "tension and release" feeling from the books they read, no matter the genre or topic, and most successful books are, in essence, "tension and release" machines. Build the tension and release dynamic into the pacing and the pages will practically turn themselves.
Style pleasure is another source of PTE that can affect readers subconsciously, though many readers also consciously appreciate it and seek it out. Beautiful rhythm, word choice, and phrasing are like catnip to these readers. Not all readers read for style. But readers on the far end of the style appreciation spectrum might be swept up enough by style PTE to keep reading regardless of what else is going on in the book.
Craft pleasure, similar to craft questions, arises for readers who are also writers or have other craft experience. Such readers might reflect, "Wow, what a nimble transition between time periods," "The sensory description in this battle is so immersive," or "This 'shell' motif is really helping to expose different sides of the premise." It's not realistic to expect all readers to consciously experience craft pleasure. On the other hand, the stronger the craft, the better the reading experience, whether enjoyed consciously, immersively, or both.
Keep in mind that PTE from pleasurability only works if the writer and reader agree on what is pleasurable. I once worked with a budding horror writer who was discouraged at reader reaction to date. She questioned whether she should even be writing horror. It turned out the only people she'd shown her work to were her siblings, all fans of inspirational/self-help writing. Carve it on my headstone: Know Your Target Audience.
Part 3: The Anti-PTE
If it's tempting to treat PTE like a force beyond your control, what about its opposite? When readers aren't turning your pages, does it seem like cruel fate? Cosmic unfairness?
Sometimes it just might be. At the same time, though, there are so many things that can go wrong with PTE right here on Earth.
I've noticed that PTE decreases when...
* The reader's questions stem from confusion about what's happening and why, not curiosity
* The reader's questions are answered too fast or never answered
* The book gives conflicting messages, making the reader unsure how they're supposed to feel about part of the content
* Book is so full of different kinds of things that the reader can't tell what it's about
* Reader feels alienated, misrepresented, judged, or threatened by the material
* Reader is simply not within the target audience! Sometimes what's needed isn't more editing, but legwork to find the readers who are already looking for your book. If you're sure the reader is within your target audience, that's when you look for other problems in the book itself.
If you're ever stuck during editing and not sure what else you can change, you could try troubleshooting for the bullet points above while adding more PTE-raising questions and points of pleasurability.
Remember, PTE increases when...
* The book immediately gives the reader questions to feel curious about, then answers them later (not too quickly!)
* The questions deepen readers' attention to core plot mechanics, genre concerns, mood, themes, and other central features of the book
* Reader feels seen/known by the material and how it is presented
* Reader wants more of the feelings, thoughts, and/or physical responses they're receiving from the current page
PTE? QED!
Categories: Advice for Writers, Annie in the Middle
