Intensity Scale

I've been working on my "Make a Scene" presentation for the Rappahannock Writers' Conference 2022 that will be held in-person and virtual on Saturday, November 5, 2022. Scenes are the building blocks of a book and have a beginning, middle, and end. Think of a three-act play or even your daily life. Mornings set the action of your day, middle of the day is when you perform those actions, and at night you are wrapping things up. Every scene has to contain new information. Tension is needed in every genre, though it varies by the genre. In the book, "Plot and Structure," by James Scott Bell, he includes an intensity scale for rating the scenes between 0 and 10. I love this idea and have included it in my presentation, giving Mr. Bell full credit. Mr. Bell states that scenes rated as 0 should probably be discarded, and those rated 10 should be few. Ten, he says, is over the top. Tension can be added through dialogue, description, and narrative. Tension is built through conflict. As in any book, pacing is critical. An author has to pace their scenes in lenght throughout the book. Too many short tension scenes will tire the reader. You want to keep the reader turning the pages. In my book, Fatal Dose, the tension rises when Caitlyn learns that illegal drugs are being shipped from New York City to Buffalo through central New York. Knowing how many lives are lost by using these drugs, she takes on the drug lord in charge of the shipments. And the tension rises.