Controlling Your Pacing

Pacing is one of my favourite things to pay attention to when reading or writing something. The pacing of a scene is literally how ‘fast’ or ‘slow’ a scene appears to be moving. Action scenes that spring the story from one place to another tend to go faster than introspective scenes or scenes that explore character dynamics.

All of this is created through putting space and words between elements of the scene. What I mean by that is that readers interpret a passage of time between ‘things’ (actions, dialogue, gestures, etc.) on the page, and pacing is controlling that interpretation.

For example,

“Georgia sat on the couch, “wow it sure is hot in here,” she said. “It sure is,” Henry agreed, sitting next to her.”

This sentence is just about the actions with some breaking dialogue, but it goes pretty quickly through what’s happening.

Whereas, if we were to intentionally pace this scene, it may look like this:

“Georgia swiped at her brow, wandering over to sink into the couch. “It sure is hot in here,” she said, peering up at Henry through the wisps of her bangs. He nodded weakly, his entire body sagging from the heat. Crossing the room to collapse next to her, he added dryly, “it sure is.”

It’s not perfect, but you can get a sense of the time between things happening. The added detail between the two characters talking conveys maybe a minute between sentences, which might be accurate for two people dogged down by a heat wave.

To speed things up, we want less space between elements:

“Adam slammed open the door with his shoulder, letting it bounce off the concrete wall behind him. “Everyone out!” He shouted. A crack in the roof snapped above them.”

The added (or subtracted) elements of a scene that control your pacing is the sights/sounds/feelings/smells/maybe tastes of a place. When we’re anxiously rushing to get out of the house we may not acknowledge that the kitchen smells like the bread our roommate baked that morning, or that there are smudges on the window from when the dog climbed up on the couch. However, when we have a second to contemplate, we’re going to notice these things, and it would be appropriate to write them in.

Another important element to controlling pacing is your character’s thoughts or acknowledgement of feelings.

For example:

“Adam slammed open the door with his shoulder, it bounced off the concrete wall behind him. He winced, his mother’s high voice ringing in his head, chiding him for damaging the walls even though he knew the building was coming down on top of them. How long would he live with her constantly in his mind? He tried to wave away the memory. “Everyone out!” He shouted.”

That slows down the scene quite a bit, yeah? And maybe that’s what you wanted in that moment. Play around with the details and pacing in your scenes, you might be surprised how much can change.

Good luck!

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reblog writing writing tips thank you writing advice this is actually very helpful

LoZ Wild Masterlist

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The Dragons

My Thoughts on Napsack Koroks

Happy Sidona Marriage

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Lynel Question

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The Wild Series is an Inevitable Event at the End of All 3 Timelines

Greater Hyrule & the Hyrule Alliance

The Symbolism Behind Link's Rings & Sage Handshakes

Link's Personal Diary

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Light Spirit Springs in TotK

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The Gerudo Feel Responsible For Ganondorf

Wild Might Have Alexithymia

Figuring Out the Depths Script

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The Seven Heroines Symbol Analysis

Mabe! (Not Mine)

Shrines of Light & the Origins of Monsters

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Blacksmiths

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Zora Weapons - Blood Warrior?

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My Opinions:

Link With Sheikah Tech Automail

I don't want to be that person, but can we, like... make fan-content of Miguel O'hara adopting every young spidy (including the live action movies) or something like that

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found family spiderman peter parker miguel ohara across the spiderverse gwen stacy miles morales spider man 2099 what do you want from me I see big bad men and i want to create them a found family ok??? i'm just a weak human

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scritohr

1 year ago

Reblog if you think asexuality is a legitimate sexuality.

I'm trying to prove something.

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reblog

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scritohr

1 year ago

To whoever needed to hear it

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reblog writing tips

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scritohr

1 year ago

Lo que hice mientras me aburría en clase // What I did while I was bored in class

Foto de un dibujo hecho en una mano de una flor pintada de morada con marcador y abajo escrito "flor morada" // Photo of a drawing on a hand of a purple flower painted with marker and below written "flor morada"

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Spotify songs tattoos bugambilia nasa histoires es como Måneskin pero en español

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scritohr

6 months ago

Reblog if you have read fan fiction better than some published books

Help me prove a point

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leap of faith catch me if you can erinwantstowrite alighterwood

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scritohr

1 year ago

Grits my teeth. Why do people always assume I want to fuck a character when I post about them enthusiastically

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fr aroace ace aro most of the time i just want to adopt them or be adopt by them and it's honestly disturbing

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scritohr

1 year ago

Writing Prompt: Dialogue

"Can you swim?"

"Just about."

"Define 'just about'?"

"I can float well enough, if I don't panic."

"Don't panic?"

"If my head goes under water I panic, even in a bathtub."

"Well, shit."

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sonic the hedgehog writing prompt c'mon now you're just describing sonic

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scritohr

5 months ago

evil is a relay sport when the one who’s burned turns to pass the torch

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scritohr

8 months ago

so you know abt the "if they're my favorite character i'm gonna be excited to see them hurt" thing but.. am i the only one who gets Annoyed when characters i dislike get whumped? like. they didn't deserve the honor, what an injustice that this is canon 😅😂

Oh, yeah, I feel that too. Like the character I like was right there for the whumping, why would you choose that one?

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