The four essential elements for sustaining interest in storytelling: stakes, suspense, surprise, and humor.
Book: Storyworthy
American novelist Matthew Dicks believes that you should assume no one wants to hear anything you want to say unless you give them a reason to listen. It's the writer's responsibility to intrigue their readers and provide that reason.
He breaks down four key elements for maintaining interest in storytelling for the readers: Stakes, Suspense, Surprise, and Humor.
Stakes are what the audience worries about or roots for. They create the reason people want to listen.
Think of it as the elephant in the room that grabs attention. When Steve Jobs said he'd been waiting two and a half years to share something, he created stakes that made everyone wonder what it was. Without stakes, audiences simply don't care what happens next. Stakes are similar to Promises in Sanderson's 3P Storytelling.
Suspense is the strategic exclusion of information. It involves strategic information management.
You tell some things but not everything, creating anticipation. Use "breadcrumbs" to drop hints about what's coming without revealing the full picture. Deploy "hourglasses" to slow down pacing right before big moments, making audiences wait when you know you have their attention. This technique works because people love solving mysteries. Suspense is related to Hitchcock's Bomb Under the Table Theory.
Surprise is subverting expectations. It works by setting expectations, then deliberately breaking them.
Use "backpacks" to load audiences with plans or hopes, then subvert those expectations. The Ocean's Eleven movies excel at this by showing the heist plan upfront, making surprises more powerful when things go wrong. Audiences become emotionally invested in the expected outcome, making the unexpected twist more impactful. Surprise is also loosely related to the But and Therefore Rule.
Humor helps ease audience tension and improve engagement. It transforms brain chemistry, making audiences feel closer to speakers and perceive them as more intelligent.
Laugh within the first 60 seconds to put people at ease. Use humor to make boring data presentations engaging by creating characters or fake companies. Strategically place humor before difficult moments to increase emotional contrast, or after them to provide relief.
Here's an example of how Matthew Dicks deploys these elements to tell an engaging story: "The Spoon of Power."