Ways to Build Suspense Shimmering pavement, asphalt
heat. Stopped talking in eastern
Utah, after Shelby hit the roadkill
and fritzed the air conditioning.
Maybe a leg, a rib, of an armadillo
in the mechanism. Western Utah,
eastern Nevada, tongues gritty
from tasting the air, sweat pooling
in elbows, anywhere skin touched
skin. Gwen falls asleep driving,
car shudders over the rumble strip, waking both of them with shock, turning
their blood to ice.
What techniques does the author use to build tension in this excerpt?