HOW STORIES SUCCEED - THE SECRET OF ADDITIVE WITHHOLDING

When you force a reader (to do your work) you might not lose that reader but you will certainly never gain them. There are better ways..

a still from Twin Peaks

We’ve discussed the basics for withholding information in our fiction in the first of our series. And how one needs to withhold and counter said withhold simultaneously in the second of our series.

Now for the deeper lore.

HOW TO WITHHOLD INFORMATION RIGHT — THE EXPERT SET

FIVE Withholds cannot be a strictly subtractive operations – to succeed they must also be vigorously ADDITIVE.

An extension of number two but because the point is so very important I’m breaking out into its own thing for the sake of clarity.

To withhold successfully, withholding’s subtraction must engender even greater addition.

This is what Craig Hammill means when he tells screenwriters: Don’t withhold; reveal, and complicate.

A maxim I reworked in my homebrew: when you withhold you must simultaneously reveal and complicate.

Reveal and complicate the Characters, their Conflicts, their Worlds —

—through intriguing impactful information.