Using Microtension in Every Scene
(Or: How to Make Readers Squirm, Sweat, and Turn Pages Like Their Life Depends On It—One Damn Line at a Time)
Let’s throw out the soft-focus advice right now: tension is not a thing you “save” for the climax or sprinkle on at big moments. If you want your writing to live—if you want readers gnawing their nails and muttering “just one more chapter” at 3am—you need microtension. That’s right. Not big explosions, not serial killers in the closet (though, hell, that’s fun too), but the little hooks that snag you, line by line, breath by breath. Microtension is the oxygen in every scene. Without it, your story suffocates.
If you’re tired of writing scenes that feel flat, scenes where the dialogue sags and the description sits like a dead fish, here’s how to pump them full of nervous energy, hidden danger, and page-turning obsession—Rusty-style.
1. What the Hell Is Microtension? (And Why Should You Care?)
Microtension is the constant pull—the friction, doubt, unease, curiosity, or discomfort that simmers under the surface of your scene.
It’s the heartbeat in a love story, the crackle in a dialogue, the shadow under the bed in a sunny kitchen.
Big Tension: Someone’s got a gun, a secret, a clock ticking down.
Microtension: Someone’s lying, flirting, stalling, hoping, second-guessing, holding back.
It’s the itch that keeps your reader from relaxing.
Dirty reality:
If there’s no microtension, your scene is dead on arrival. Even your most poetic lines become filler. Readers start checking their phones, or worse, your Amazon reviews.
2. Why Microtension Matters More Than “Big Drama”
Everyone knows to ramp things up in the climax, but microtension is how you get them there. It’s the difference between a slow-burn romance and a bland soap opera, a chilling thriller and a cardboard cutout of a villain.
Confession:
The best scenes I ever wrote had two people eating dinner—nothing happened, but everything was at stake. A glance, a loaded silence, the wrong question at the worst time. If you can make a reader sweat during dinner, you own them.
3. Step-By-Step: How to Inject Microtension Into Every Scene
A. Let No One Be Comfortable
Every character should want something different in the scene—even if it’s just to hide their boredom.
Even friends, lovers, family—let there be secrets, resentments, tiny wounds.
B. Ask, What’s At Risk Right Now?
Even if it’s “just” embarrassment, misunderstanding, losing face, or missing an opportunity—let there be stakes.
Don’t let your characters coast. If the reader knows everyone’s safe, you’re sunk.
C. Weaponize Subtext
Make your dialogue mean more than what’s said. Let the reader sense the hidden agenda.
Every “hello” could be “I miss you,” “I hate you,” or “I dare you.”
D. Unanswered Questions Are Gold
Never resolve everything. Let something dangle.
End a scene on a line that makes the reader want to peek ahead.
“She smiled, but her hands were shaking.”
E. Physicality Is Your Secret Weapon
Fidgeting, touching, glances, pauses, sudden stillness—these say more than words.
Describe the gut—the flutter, the knot, the itch.
4. Ingredient Hacks: Techniques That Actually Work
Contradictory Emotions: Let a character laugh while hurting, flirt while plotting, relax while ready to bolt.
Interruptions: Let the phone ring at the worst moment, the wrong person walk in, a crucial word get swallowed.
Objects with Meaning: The cup no one touches, the door left ajar, the necklace fingered in silence.
Time Pressure: A scene dragging? Add a clock, a deadline, a reason someone needs to leave.
Survival strategy:
Cut every line that doesn’t create or increase tension—even if it’s “pretty.” Make every sentence beg for the next.
5. Confessions from the Trenches
Some of my best scenes were nothing but glances and unsaid things. Readers raved about them for years. The trick? Don’t let the reader—or the character—get comfortable.
In a recent novel, two characters spent an entire chapter trying not to admit they wanted to kiss. The tension? Nuclear.
6. The Final Dare: Make Every Page Hum With Microtension
If your scene feels flat, it is. If you’re bored writing it, your reader’s already gone.
Start with a secret, a wound, a want. Keep it alive, never let it resolve, and twist the knife—sentence by sentence—until the very last word.
Because the best stories aren’t the ones where everything explodes—
they’re the ones where you can’t look away,
because the fuse is burning just beneath the skin.
Go light it.
And never, ever let them rest.