When I was twenty-three I visited Georgia for the first time. I also moved there less than two months later, but that’s a different story. While I was visiting I got to go to Six Flags.

And I had an amazing time with the wonderful person I would marry three years later. I got to ride standing up roller coasters and lying down roller coasters, and spinny rides that pushed the boundries of survivable G-forces. And there were Looney Toons – which I love. And a Batman roller coaster, and, and, and…

8-D

I was thinking about this whole ‘can’t summon intense enough emotion’ thing. It’s not completely true. I have lots of negatives bottled up and it’s pretty easy to make anger and irritation explode all inside my brain cavity. Mentally volitile…that’s about right. Or just mental.

I pondered this today, because I’ve been putting a lot of thought into how to get my writing back. I also got the cheap fast food coffee, and I’m just lucky I really needed the caffeine or it would have been a waste of money *is not a fan of cheap coffee*. But I was pondering emotion, and my stories, and how it all intertwines.

And something hit me. Something I’ve heard said before, but has never quite impacted me in this way. A story can’t be all lows. Even a dark story has to have something in it somewhere that’s not bottom of the pit. Even if it ends with all of the good people dead, at some point you have to give your reader a chance to breath.

Sweetie calls it pacing, and compares it to a roller coaster.

Almost all roller coasters start the same way: that slow creep to the top of the first hill. To me, that’s the most terrifying bit of the entire ride. Why? Because you know at the top of the hill you’re going to be plunged into a gut-wrenching downfall. Kind of like reading a good story where you know the underlying tension is about to make things explode, but you’re not quite there yet.

So the car reaches the top of the hill, it crests the peak, and then it plummets. Some people scream, others throw their hands up in the air, and pretty much everyone feels their gut jump into their throat as it tries to escape the negative G’s. The car reaches the bottom of the peak, and you have a moment to catch your breath, but not a long one. That moment is important, though. That little pause in your story allows the reader to get their bearings and process that their gut has returned to home base.

But if the car just sits there after that, the ride is over. You can’t let that happen. The roller coaster is heading back up another hill. This one is probably shorter, and doesn’t take as long to get to the top, or back to the bottom. Same result, but at a faster pace. Now you’ve hooked your reader, and they can’t wait for the next bump of conflict. But you’ve got something up your sleeve – the next gut-defying chapter isn’t a hill, but a spiral. A twist. Something in the plot that no one saw coming, but should have becasue all the clues were there. And in your roller coaster you’re tossed to one side and then another (my favorite part of the ride, by the way. Goes back to the love of spinny rides).

And as things draw toward the close, there’s going to be another one or two giant hills. Something that takes you to new highs sends you plunging far and fast. The biggest spike in the entire ride. Story climax, anyone?

And you plunge down, screaming and knowing it’s all going to be over soon. Maybe a little ill, but still right there through all of it. And when the car reaches the bottom of the hill, the ride doesn’t come to an abrupt halt, just like a story doesn’t end right after the big climax. It has a little bit of track to slow itself down.

And when everything, book or roller coaster, come to a screaching halt at the end of the line, you’re left feeling a little disappointed. But if the writer has done their job, you’re standing in line again as soon as you can.

And what this has to do with me? I think I’ve forgotten how to have fun, and no one wants to read a story filled with characters not having fun. It would be like a ride where you had to climb the steps to the top, get strapped in, and dropped one-hundred feet. Ride over, do it again. Bleh. Time to find a good roller coaster instead.

Are you ready for the ride to begin?