Cliffhangers: how to make readers turn the page

A cliffhanger ends a chapter or scene at a moment of suspense, leaving a question unanswered. It is how authors keep you reading long past bedtime.

End on a question

“When she turned around, the door she had just come through was gone.” The reader must know what happened.

End on a reveal

Drop one piece of surprising information and stop: “The handwriting on the note was her own.”

End on a decision

“He had ten seconds to choose: the bridge, or the river.”

In a short story

You may not have chapters, but you can still end scenes or sections with small cliffhangers to keep the tension building towards your climax.

Always pay it off

A cliffhanger is a promise. The next scene must answer the question, or the reader will feel cheated.

Try it: read the first chapter of “The Hound of the Baskervilles” in our Free Library and notice the final line. Then write three possible cliffhanger lines for your own story.