Scene Transitions

I believe one of the hardest things for me to write are transitions from one scene to another. There are lapses in time between interesting events in real life and so even more true in fiction. We never tell anyone about the regular day we had in our lives, we tell them about the exciting things we have done or been involved in.  So, it is boring to read about a character eating, brushing his teeth, shopping etc.

Introducing a new scene may be in the same place or another.  But there must be some sort of change in your protagonist.  As I try to make my transitions smoother, I need to think of what happened in the previous scene and what my protagonist wants in the next one. Get into his/her head as his thoughts move the story forward, what he mulls about what happened in the last scene and what he hopes to achieve in the next one.

The scenes must relate to the story in a progressive order.  I cannot plop my hero/ine down in the middle of nowhere, and have the reader trying to guess where she/he is.  It's good to show in the first couple of lines where our hero is and what she is doing. 

If the scene is in the same place, perhaps now it is night instead of day. Or if the MC has gone somewhere else having her slam the car door and rush down the drive to knock on a door. 

I have found the most helpful for me is Make a Scene by Jordan E. Rosenfeld.