You know, there's a quote that says that jealousy in a loving relationship is a lot like salt in your food. Just enough can enrich and enhance flavor, but too much can bitter the taste. I think that, when it comes to putting cliffhangers in your stories, perhaps from chapter to chapter, or maybe even from completed novel to completed novel...the same rule applies. I mean, sure, you can write cliffhangers all day long if you really wanted to...but it can get tiresome in the long run. In fact, I think they would get to be pretty frustrating and predictable if you use them too often. And that would be a serious blow to your writing in general.

Now, when I say 'cliffhangers', I'm not just talking about writing a compelling chapter that will make your readers curious and highly interested in what is going to happen next. I think we should all be doing that with every chapter that we write anyway. I'm talking about a big, shocking, 'dun dun dun', moment that rocks your readers and shakes the story up in one way or another. A major event, or a secret reveal, or a big plot element that comes out of nowhere and threatens your characters' stability and the balance of the story itself. There's a difference.

The best way for me to describe the difference between the two would be for me to use "The Empire Strikes Back" as an example. The way that the movie ends...there are SO many loose ends that are just left up in the air. It's actually a really dark ending for, what was mainly thought of as a kid's movie. Nothing really gets resolved, the heroes are scattered and defeated, you don't really know what happened to Han Solo, Luke Skywalker loses a hand and finds out his father is one of the most evil men in the galaxy...it's almost kind of depressing when you really think about it. Hehehe! Now that is a definitive ending to that particular chapter of the story...but it leaves so many questions open that everybody watching immediately has a huge incentive to see what happens in the next movie. I guess you could call that a 'soft cliffhanger'. Enticing, but satisfying in its delivery of a clear 'ending' and a break in the overall storyline.

Now...a 'hard cliffhanger'? That would be like if Luke is fighting Darth Vader, he loses his hand, and hears, "No...I am your father!"

"Nooooo!!!!"

Fade to black!

Roll credits! Hehehe!

Had the movie ended right there, it would have been a huge WTF moment for the audience! Intriguing, yes...but...ARRRGHHHH!!! You don't even get to see the end of the fight. Just, 'I am your father', cut to the credits, 'to be continued'! Oh yeah...spoiler alert. Hehehe! Well, let's be honest...if you don't know that from Star Wars, and the prequels, and the sequels, and the animated series, and decades of pop culture, by now...chances are you really don't care at this point. LOL! But, that's the difference.

On occasion, a real surprise ending can be used to spice up your story and really throw your audience into a tailspin that they were never expecting to get caught up in. And when the comments come rolling in, you can take pride in knowing that you delivered the kind of sucker punch to the gut that you were trying for! Hehehe!

But don't overdo it.

When used correctly (and sparingly), a really good 'zinger' of a cliffhanger can enhance your story in many ways, and actually generate a much deeper interest from your audience when it comes to the next chapter. It creates excitement, inspires a craving for more, and can actually spawn a discussion between readers outside of the story itself. But you have to know when and where a cliffhanger will be the most effective, and which one to use to carry the story forward. You can only throw so many monkey wrenches into the gears before the whole system breaks down and ceases to work the way you want it to anymore. So you don't want to let those big surprises get stale and wear out their welcome.

This time around, I'd like to talk about cliffhangers. And a few do's and don'ts when it comes to keeping your readers on edge, without desensitizing them to the impact that you were hoping your cliffhangers would have.

I can remember when I was in elementary/junior high school, and this was in the 80's, so marketing toys to children was...shameless to the point of being absolutely obscene. Hehehe! But I was the target audience, so what did I know back then, right? Anyway, I remember after school cartoons, and the tons of action figures and sugary breakfast cereals that were being sold to us with every commercial break. Inspector Gadget, He-Man, G.I. Joe, Transformers, Thundercats, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles...these were the cartoons that most kids would run home to see during the week after school. But out of all the cheesy, patronizing, commercials that I remember from that time...one series of advertisements sticks out to me. It was for this collection of action figures called the 'Sectaurs'! They were half-man, half-insect, warriors that were always fighting with each other for some reason. You know, the typical 'blah blah blah' good versus evil trope. Whatever, kid...just ask your parents to buy my shit! Right?

But the interesting thing about the advertising campaign for these toys was that it was marketed as a serial story. A commercial would start, where the figures were involved in some sort of combat situation...something 'surprising' would happen...and then the commercial would end with a big cliffhanger that you had to come back to later in order to find out what happens next in this crucial part of the story. Now, understand, this was before TV shows had become like they are today. That wasn't necessarily a thing back then unless it was an actual daytime soap opera. Not really. It didn't matter if you watch the episodes of 'The A Team' or 'Family Ties' out of order. There were no spoilers involved if you missed an episode of 'The Smurfs' or 'Superfriends' on a Saturday morning. Every episode stood on its own, and was pretty much interchangeable with any other episode at the time. But here was a series of commercials that was building a linear story arc, developing characters, and hitting you with a cliffhanger every single episode...and all within the limited time span of thirty to thirty five seconds. You want to find out what happens next? Watch this same cartoon next week, and check out the next installment during the commercial break!

At the time, I had never ever seen anything like that on TV. It was the coolest thing ever! It FORCED you to watch the commercials. Because, how else are you going to find out what happened to your heroes after the last ad? You couldn't miss a single addition to the story, or you'd be completely lost in the next one, as well as the conversations going on with your friends on the playground the next day! Hehehe, and the term 'spoiler' hadn't even been coined yet! So it was, like...a different world, I suppose.

I'm so glad that I was able to find a bunch of these old ads on Youtube to demonstrate my point. This is a taste of what I'm talking about. The more I think about it, the more I realize how truly brilliant this marketing campaign was. Imagine watching cartoons as a kid, and having to wait for the next commercial break to get your REAL fix for the afternoon. Hehehe!

(My apologies for the video and audio quality. But there was no HD anything back then either, so it's a miracle that anybody was able to upload these at all! Hehehe!)

Now, again...these advertisers were all attempting to tell a story, solve a problem, and create a new cliffhanger, in thirty seconds flat. That's ten seconds for each part of a three act chapter. Luckily, you guys have a lot more room to plot things out as writers. But you sort of get the idea, right? A good cliffhanger is all about questions and choices. What kind of threat does the current situation pose for your main character, and what are his or her options in terms of finding the best way out of it? This doesn't have to be a physical threat, where your protagonist is about to have his skull cracked open with a giant rock or eaten by a monstrous spider. It simply has to leave the story standing at a fork in the road, with the big decision of which path to take left over, consequences and all.

Is your main character going to finally talk to his big crush for the first time? Is he going to finally speak up and come out to his parents, or his best friend? Is he going to put his key into the ignition of the car and try to drive home...even though he's been drinking heavily and knows that it's a risk to even try? When creating an effective cliffhanger, I feel that there has to be multiple outcomes available for the reader to ponder until the next chapter is available. What now? You've just been caught kissing another boy by your boyfriend! You've just challenged the school bully to a fist fight! Maybe you've had enough of the pain, and you're crying while holding a bottle of sleeping pills in your trembling hand! The question remains...what now?

THAT'S where you cut the chapter off! Boom!

And now, any reader who is invested in this character and this story...can't just turn away! Nooooo! Don't stop there! Where's the next chapter? I won't be able to sleep tonight if I don't know how this turns out.

Cleverly placed throughout your project, these cliffhangers can create an intense escalation of events that will keep your readers locked in until the very end. Present a dire situation to your audience, maybe give a hint or two as to what choices are available to them...and then fade to black without a definitive answer. You want to know what happens next? Keep reading. Otherwise, it's just going to fester in the back of your mind until you decide to come back for the next scene. If this sounds manipulative...that's probably because it is. Extremely so. Hehehe! But one of your main tools as a writer when it comes to generating a flow and a continuous sense of momentum in your story...comes from mystery. And mystery comes from having the readers ask questions. Questions come from choices. If the main character takes Path A...what will that lead to? If he takes Path B...what would that lead to? I think the BEST cliffhangers contain elements of reward and consequence on all of the paths that can be taken, no matter which one your protagonist chooses. The main character can't win without sacrificing something important to them, and sometimes..it may seem like the main character can't win at all...but must make a choice regardless. If you can paint the picture of a serious dilemma in just the right spots of your story? Your audience will drive themselves crazy trying to figure out the next step, and they will come back, thirsty for more. Every time.

However...you can't keep pulling the same rabbit out of a hat and expect it to have the same 'Wow' effect every chapter. The best thing about cliffhangers is that they're unpredictable. They pop up out of nowhere, and they raise the eyebrows of everybody reading, because they didn't see them coming. One good way to accomplish this in your story is to completely flip the tone of your chapter at the very last minute. If it's a romantic, happy, warm and fuzzy, chapter...have something shocking or maybe even tragic happen in the last few paragraphs. If it's sad, angry, or a chapter where there doesn't seem to be any hope at all of your main character getting access to the boy of his dreams...maybe he comes home and his dream boy is sitting on his front steps...wanting to talk. Instant exhilaration. I like to call this 'flipping the coin'. Immerse your readers in one emotion, and then suddenly drop them or pick them up to feel the exact opposite at the end of your chapter. And JUST as they're getting accustomed to the bait and switch...you cut them off, and you let them decide if they want to jump forward to see what happens next. The rapid emotional shift in tone, followed by that final period at the end of the last sentence in that chapter, will create the desired effect. Trust me. It's a dirty trick, but it works.

Hehehe, don't judge me! I'm not being MEAN! This is what authors do! Use this technique to your advantage whenever you see fit. It won't turn you into a literary sadist, I promise.

There is one thing that you DON'T want to do with a cliffhanger, however...and that's cheat your audience. You want to make good on your promise that, whether good results or bad results, the next chapter will be worth the wait and that it follows the precise set up that precedes it. The worst thing that you can do is try to somehow 'rewrite' the previous chapter to say something that it didn't say the first time around. Setting up a powerful cliffhanger takes planning. Events have to not only be set into motion ahead of time, but you need time to let those events breathe in the background for a chapter or two before you bring them back for that special 'gotchya' moment. If your main character was abandoned by his mother at birth, and you have plans for her to come knocking at his front door to introduce herself for the very first time...don't just have it happen out of the blue. You need to start setting up that moment waaaay before then, much earlier in the story, and then let it sort of fade into the background for a while so other elements in the story can take center stage for a few chapters. Then...knock knock...and BOOM! There's your cliffhanger! It has an impact far greater than just randomly having her show up for no reason. It feels fraudulent. Readers will think you just threw that in there for the sake of a gotchya moment...and you end up exposing the magic trick. Plan ahead. The worst thing you can do is finish a chapter, come up with a completely different idea further down the road, and find yourself trying to ret-con your way out of it. That's a cheat. And a big no-no. Hehehe! You have to remember that you have an audience that is truly invested in you as the narrator of this story, and they're putting their faith in you to tell the truth at all times when setting up a big cliffhanger like the ones you may have in mind. You don't want to ruin that trust if you can help it. It'll piss them off, big time.

Here is a scene from one of my favorite Stephen King movies, "Misery", that depicts this idea perfectly...

Sometimes, you have to remember how long it takes to write a complete story from beginning to end, and you don't want to disrupt the suspension of disbelief and take your readers out of your vision by making continuity errors like these. Your audience is reading closely. Much closer than you may think. So if you're editing things yourself or have an outside editor checking things out for you, try to catch anything that might be bordering on a cop out when it comes to cliffhangers. I think this is best avoided by not 'going back' when you start the following chapter. Don't start off by recreating the end of the last chapter and changing the details. That's walking on thin ice. If you want a cool cliffhanger, just cut the chapter off with your hero in the car, getting ready to go off of the cliff. Stop right there. And then start your next chapter by having 'Rocket Man' find a clever way to escape the car. That would be much more entertaining, in my opinion. And it will show the ingenuity of your protagonist, strengthening him as a character in the long run. Another example, don't have something big happen...and then start off the next chapter with your protagonist waking up in a cold sweat. "Oh, it was all a dream!" That weakens the impact of your cliffhanger, and your audience might not trust you the next time you toss some major drama their way. Stay away from that stuff. It's considered a cheat. And your readers won't be happy about being left in the dark for an extended amount of time, only to be fooled with some fictional sleight of hand. K?

Anyway, that's my personal take on writing cliffhangers. The important points to remember are...

1. Don't overdo it. A cliffhanger here and there is great. But too much ruins the flavor.
2. Cliffhangers are based on suspense. And suspense is created by mystery, questions, and choices. Rewards and consequences. Readers should be asking themselves, "What now?" Pose that question, and bait them into the next chapter by promising them an answer.
3. Don't try to change the details of the cliffhanger by going back to tell readers details that contradict or attempt to ret-con the previous chapter. You're better off cutting the chapter before the necessary ret-con takes place. Reader/Writer trust is important. Never take that for granted.

I hope this helps you guys out when you consider adding any cliffhangers into your projects in the future. It's just a few things to think about, and interpret any way that you like.

Take care! And I'll see ya on the next go round!