The Cliffhanger/Hook Combination
In Today's Journal
* Quotes of the Day
* Busy Morning Yesterday
* Storytelling at Depth
* The Cliffhanger/Hook Combination
* The Introductory Hook
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
Quotes of the Day
"We turn not older with years, but newer every day." Emily Dickinson
"Cliffhangers will make your books move faster and be unable to be put down." Dean Wesley Smith
Busy Morning Yesterday
After I posted TNDJ, I prepped posts for the next two days, then uploaded The Darling Members Club in eleven installments to Your Morning Serial. Chapters 1 & 2 went live this morning at 5 a.m.
Click Subscribe at the end of that first installment to receive the remaining installments in your inbox through May 26 when the story will wrap.
Then I prepped a handout that I'll send to anyone who wants it (see below), then finally turned to my current novel.
Storytelling at Depth
Since I just announced a new short story contest, I thought I'd publish a new short series of three posts on Storytelling at Depth.
In this series, I'll talk about the Cliffhanger/Hook combo, then throw in a couple of posts on Grounding the Reader and one more on Pacing.
It works like this:
The initial hook and opening pull the readers into the story.
Grounding them in the setting engages them and keeps them deep.
The cliffhanger/hook combo and the pacing keep them turning pages.
Remember that after the cliffhanger and hook, you must ground the reader again.
So? You write another opening to ground the reader in the new setting/scene, then keep typing as the story unfolds around you.
The Cliffhanger/Hook Combination
The cliffhanger and hook work in concert to push and pull the reader through the story.
The cliffhanger comes at the end of a major scene (and/or chapter) and connects to the hook at the beginning of the next scene or chapter.
The cliffhanger poses a compelling problem or asks a compelling question that causes the reader to read past the scene break or turn the page to find out what happens next. It 'pushes' the reader through to the next hook.
Then the hook grabs the reader and 'pulls' him into the opening, which moves him into the next scene or chapter.
Note than you can also use cliffhangers and hooks inside major scenes when transitioning from one subscene to the next.
A series of well-written cliffhanger-hook combinations, combined with pacing, creates a page-turning story or novel.
This is true of ANY genre, not only thrillers and action-adventures. It’s true even of the normally very slow and staid literary novel.
As with hooks, brevity and conveying a sense of drama are the key to a good cliffhanger.
Most often, a single terse sentence will do. Sometimes it takes a short paragraph or a few short, terse, one-sentence paragraphs. Everything depends on the flow of the story and what’s happening.
Note: If the energy of the scene or chapter seems to fade or drain away, chances are good you wrote past the cliffhanger by a few sentences. Scroll back a few paragraphs or a page or so and read what you wrote. The cliffhanger usually will pop out at you.
What’s important, as always, is that you (the Observer/Recorder) run with the characters through their world. As you go, note what happens and the reactions of the characters in dialogue and action. The characters and the situations will automatically hand you cliffhangers.
Then, during cycling, if you (the Writer) feel the cliffhanger isn’t quite as effective as it could be, you can shorten or lengthen it, change a word or two, delete or add a sentence, etc.
The Introductory Hook
The hook at the beginning of a story is most often a terse, drama-evoking sentence or paragraph that directly engages the reader on some emotional level.
A short sentence, or a few short sentences in a short paragraph, is usually best. Are there notable exceptions? Yes.
Ernest Hemingway himself, in his first two “rules of writing,” advised writers to
Use short sentences, and
Use short paragraphs.
That’s great advice, by the way.
Yet in some of his short stories he hooked readers with one very long, emotion-laden, heart-pumping sentence that was also its own paragraph.
As the Observer/Recorder of the story, always allow the characters to set the hook for you. It’s their story, after all.
Then, as the Writer, fine-tune the hook and the rest of the story as necessary during cycling (but always in the creative subconscious) for presentation to the readers.
The purpose of the hook at the beginning of a story or scene or chapter is to jar or grab the reader and drag him into the story.
But the purpose of the cliffhanger/hook combo INSIDE the scene or chapter is to provide connecting tissue for the story. It still compels and then propels the reader, but in a more subliminal way.
A great hook in any usage will accomplish one or more of the following:
Convey a sense that the reader is crossing or has crossed a threshold.
Convey a sense of intimacy, that you’re letting the reader in on a secret.
Convey a sense of immediacy through emotion: intrigue, curiosity, fear, etc.
Pull the reader immediately into the mood of the story or scene (ominous, dark, light, humorous, frightening, etc.)
The hook can also hint at the main conflict in the story or scene.
For a few examples of cliffhanger/hook combos
and stand-alone introductory hooks, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com.
Next up, Grounding the Reader.
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Of Interest
How Authors are Thinking About AI I took part in this survey. I agree that using AI for any reason other than the "generative" construction of stories is fine (e.g., spell checking).
2 Great Email Services for Authors in 2025... Learn how to build a list.
Free Mailerlite Course for Authors
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………… 990
Writing of Blackwell Ops 44: Sam Granger | Following the Ghost Trail
Day 1…… 3613 words. To date…… 3613
Day 2…… 2893 words. To date…… 6506
Day 3…… 1824 words. To date…… 8330
Day 4…… 3025 words. To date…… 11355
Day 5…… 3697 words. To date…… 15052
Day 6…… 3428 words. To date…… 18480
Day 7…… 1013 words. To date…… 19493
Day 8…… 2993 words. To date…… 22486
Fiction for May………………………... 49490
Fiction for 2025………………………. 427903
Nonfiction for May………………........ 13870
Nonfiction for 2025…………………… 114960
2025 consumable words…………….. 536350
Average Fiction WPD (May)……...... 3299
2025 Novels to Date…………………….. 10
2025 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2025 Short Stories to Date……………… 26
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………..... 114
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……… 296
Short story collections……………………. 29
Whatever you believe, unreasoning fear and the myths that outlining, revising, and rewriting will make your work better are lies. They will always slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.
Writing fiction should never be something that stresses you out. It should be fun. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Because of WITD and because I endeavor to follow those Rules I am a prolific professional fiction writer. You can be too.
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I need to work on my hooks to make them a little stronger. Also need more cliffhangers. Thanks for the reminder.