Shadows of Fear: A Tense Homecoming

1. Uneasy Homecoming By Will F Jenkins

2. Building Suspense … • Time: • “The last thin sliver of crimson sun went down below the world’s edge.” • The safety of day is over • Sense of descending into hell • Darkness encourages your imagination to run wild • Place: • Lonely, isolated • Sense of vulnerability • Plays on a common fear of being alone in an empty house

3. Building Suspense … • Immediate sense of uneasiness: • From the title • From the first sentence • Uncertainty (for Connie and the reader) about whether the threat is real or imagined • Foreshadowing (hints of trouble), e.g. the window, motorbike, telephone conversation • Dramatic irony • The author makes Connie’s fear universal: • “But it was also the unnerving realization that the fears she’d had about Them, the men who prey on others, were not entirely groundless.”

4. Building Suspense … • Pacing: • The author releases details steadily, bit by bit, so the reader doesn’t get a chance to relax • He confirms the presence of a burglar - thereby easing the tension - but then immediately escalates it again by introducing the threat of violence • Keeps the reader guessing: • He suggests possibilities … but they don’t work out (e.g. the telephone, riding the motorbike) • The audience wonders how she is going to get away • We are unsure of the burglar’s identity right up to the end (Tom??) even though she knows who it is

5. Building Suspense … • Word choice: • Dread, red dying sun, uneasy feeling intensified, restlessness, apprehension, silence, absurd, unbearable, infinite despair, unnerving, fears, etc, etc • Ellipsis: • “So he would go into the bedroom and look under the bed …” • Senses: • Uses sight and smell