Read the excerpt from a short story. the apartment house had a communal attic rarely visited by its tenants. the labeled boxes and cast-off furniture offered little intrigue, so few explored its depths. then one rainy afternoon, i ventured there seeking solitude. roaming beyond the beams of the lone ceiling bulb, i spied only cobwebs until i rounded the corner of a hulking armoire. beyond this antique was unrelenting shadow, but i willed myself to advance. then a grim bellow of thunder resounded, sending me to the floor. prostrate on the splintered beams, my hands felt a shaft of cold steel and i could but imagine the evil article i’d encountered. what technique does the author use to build suspense in the excerpt?
a. the word choice darkens the tone.
b. odd characters are introduced.
c. the setting details are intentionally omitted.
d. the outcome of events becomes uncertain.

The technique the author uses to build suspense in the excerpt is:

A) The word choice darkens the tone.

Explanation:

We reach letter A as a conclusion to this question through a process of elimination. After reading the excerpt, we can safely rule out letter B. Odd characters have not been introduced in this excerpt. As a matter of fact, the focus of this excerpt is the setting, the place where the action is happening, not the characters. For that same reason, letter C can also be excluded. The setting details are plenty, and that information is made more impactful via word choice. We can imagine the old, dark, spidery attic. Letter D is the one that might give letter A a run for its money. We could indeed say that the outcome of events becomes uncertain, but that is only because we are reading an excerpt, not the full story. It does not seem that the author intends to leave the "cold steel" unaddressed and unresolved.

For those reasons, the best option is letter A. The author chooses words that build up a suspenseful mood. The tone of the excerpt is serious and somber; the description of the attic makes it seem haunted or, at least, full of secrets. Words that help form the tone are: depths, rainy, solitude, lone, cobwebs, unrelenting shadow, grim bellow of thunder, cold steel, evil article.

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