It should go without saying that your story structure should be on point to keep readers going. For our purposes here, let’s discuss the engagement techniques that go into your actual writing—paragraph to paragraph, page to page, scene to scene. 

 

    People read fiction for countless reasons, but whenever they keep turning pages, there are—broadly speaking—two basic mechanisms at play. I call them the likability/bonding mechanism and the curiosity/anticipation mechanism. These are the unconscious calculations we make to decide whether or not we will continue to give our attention to a story (or really anything else. But a book, unlike a boring colleague, doesn’t carry with it the social pressure to keep smiling and nodding at it, so readers can withdraw their attention from it with impunity). 

 

    The best stories make use of both of these mechanisms, but it’s good to understand how each one works so that you can better diagnose, as well as fix, elements that disengage your reader.  

 

The Likability/Bonding Mechanism

    As the name implies, this is the reader’s assessment on whether they like what they’re reading. In general, when it comes to stories written in words (we’re not talking about movies, comics, audiobooks, etc. here) this is influenced by:

• how it’s written (tone) and 

• what it’s about (content). 

    In other words: are your sentences readable, perhaps even enjoyable, and does the reader like the stuff you’re writing about. 

 

    Out of the two mechanisms this one has a lot less potential room for improvement because, well, people like what they like. That goes for both the reader and you as a writer. If your heart is set on funny sci-fi with a strong undercurrent of helter skelter adventure, it would be difficult to throw yourself into crafting a moody historical novel revolving around the subtleties of hosting neighbors for dinner. If someone truly does not like funny sci-fi adventures, you can write the most epic masterpiece in that genre and they still wouldn’t want to read it, and if they did read it, they might hate it. And that’s okay. Know your audience. That said, there are a few techniques you can employ to make it more likely that your audience will genuinely like your work. 

 

The Curiosity/Anticipation Mechanism

    This name should also be relatively self-explanatory. A written narrative generally pushes our curiosity/anticipation buttons by:

• giving us enough information so that we can begin predicting the answer to an unanswered question

• generating a sense of progress toward solving a problem

    This mechanism revolves quite heavily around information management and information pacing. The keys to success include clarity of information, goal-oriented scenes, potential consequences effectively laid out, avoidance of unnecessary repetition, and any mystery or unknown that is raised appearing relevant. 

 

    This mechanism is much less content-dependent for its effectiveness. Whether you’re writing a romance, a thriller, or a complete genre blender, you will want your readers to be predicting what happens next and guessing how your characters will get out of the pickle their goal-oriented behaviors landed them in. I find that writers who have great instincts for this often can’t even identify what they’re doing. So when they can’t instinctively solve a problem they get discouraged, thinking it’s a matter of the muse or the capricious nature of good and bad days. This is why I find it very important for writers to understand their own wizardry behind the curtain, so they can more effectively diagnose and solve these audience engagement issues when they arise. 

 

    Of the two mechanisms, this one leans a lot more into the realm of writing as craft while the other feels more like writing as artistry. As mentioned above, both are necessary to the art form that is fiction writing. 

 

Discussing Some Techniques in Detail

    Here are The Writers’ Toolbox podcast episodes where I explain some common likability/bonding techniques:​​​​​​​​​​​