Pulling off a Good Plot Twist

[Zodia195]

I was reading one of my old comments today and the person thought I was foreshadowing too much on what could be plot twists. For me though foreshadowing is the only to successfully pull off a plot twist because I love them and always have at least one.

In the past I've read stories where a plot twist comes out of nowhere. Unfortunately I use to do this with my stories when I first started writing. For me if there's no hint of what is going to happen, I feel the twist is too jarring and it's almost like a 'deus ex machina' moment.

So here's my question to ya'll, how do ya'll pull off successful plot twists? Besides foreshadowing, I also try to be subtle with certain moments like if you don't catch it, you'll miss it.

 

[lovecraft68]

In Every Dog has its day-since removed from here-The serial killer is the detective's wife. I wracked my brain how to do this so it would be plausible, but still keep the reader in the dark

Then I decided I was spending too much time on that and had a better idea. I foreshadowed enough and gave enough clues the reader could figure it out and they're thinking they know and are feeling oh so clever.

They get to the reveal and are still feeling oh so clever.

Then I hit them over the head with a twist they never saw coming because they were so obsessed with Who's the killer? Okay, I know now...and paid attention to nothing else. The equivalent to getting someone to focus on your right hand in a magic trick while you're left is up to something

 

[sr71plt]

I don't hammer the reader in the head with "this is a clue to the twist," but I always try to include enough earlier in the story that the twist is logical and believable. I want the reader to be on the journey with me, and there's no down side for them to have figured it out by the end, if they had to work at it.

In the same vein, in my mysteries, I quite often make the one who is most logical one to have done it be the one who did it (in a counter twist to the usual TV plot device, where you look for the highest paid actor who couldn't have been the one but who isn't a regular on the series). What I like to do in those cases, though, is to put the twist in why they did it.

 

[Areala-chan]

Most of my stories here have a bit of a plot twist at some point, although "The Story of Us" is as straightforward as it gets.

"Best Friends" has a twist concerning the relationship of the two girls in that each is hiding something from the other, pretending to be something they aren't.

"Four Little Words" doesn't have a twist per se, but it does have a question the reader is hopefully left wondering about up until the reveal.

"Crash Into Me" has my favorite and most devious one, and according to the comments it's snared multiple readers.

What's the fun of writing a story where everything happens as a reader expects, after all?

 

[My I]

I usually have the plot twist at the very end and give nothing away. This was the reader never sees it coming and is left wondering for a minute, or a week, what the hell just happened there.

The Striped Shirt is a good example.

 

[Zodia195]

I love the red herring idea. I did come up with one in a story idea of mine. The plot twist was so complicated that I came up with the ending first.

 

[HandsInTheDark]

Twists are good. Not necessary, but good. But even better is the Sudden Comprehension. "Oh... I see it now. That thing that didn't quite make sense... and that offhand comment... now I understand!" Like sr71plt said, I want the reader along for the ride, sometimes kept up and sometimes a couple of steps behind, but always finding that next marker or roadsign keeping them on the path. And near the end they get to the top of the hill and they see it all... that's a good feeling, if they've invested in the story from the start.

Foreshadowing is meant (my opinion) to put the reader in a state where they anticipate for, and hope for (or fear for) something. It's atmospheric and somewhat heavy. I think of it as different than a hint, which is something you let slide ever so gently before a twist.

I've had a character get caught in a sudden thunderstorm and complain to the sky that it was overdoing the melodramatic foreshadowing. He was right, too. I mean you might as well play with your tools...

 

[Elloelle]

I hate when guys twist my plots cause they do it too hard and stuff but girls do it better cause they know.

Debbie

 

[Zodia195]

I've had a character get caught in a sudden thunderstorm and complain to the sky that it was overdoing the melodramatic foreshadowing. He was right, too. I mean you might as well play with your tools...

Omg, your character broke the 4th wall? I never considered doing that in my stories, but it might be fun if I ever decide to come up with a comedy. But that's a long way off.

Anyway, I can see what you mean by the difference between hints and foreshadowing.

 

[RetroFan]

One of my stories Bridget the Bossy Bridezilla - about cheating yuppies in the early 1990s - has a plot twist that comes in in the final line, which turns the events of the story into a complex web of sexual liaisons between the main characters.

But nobody really seemed interested in it, and in fact one reader asked where the ending was. I guess they didn't get it, or react to it the way I had hoped.

 

[HandsInTheDark]

Omg, your character broke the 4th wall? I never considered doing that in my stories, but it might be fun if I ever decide to come up with a comedy. But that's a long way off.

Anyway, I can see what you mean by the difference between hints and foreshadowing.

Well, yes and no. I mean he was saying it tongue-in-cheek, breaking a fourth wall that wasn't really there, except it was.

Other than orgasms, and letting some segment of the readership discover their submissive or dominant side, my writing is for me to have fun with. No point in writing about joy if you never get a laugh, someone once said, and they were right.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

Plot twists (unexpected results) are CONFOUNDS. When you do an experiment and the result aint what you expect, its a confound. A surprise.

Confounds are low probability.

Or high probability. A scene from HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME comes to mind. A woman gives Esmeralda to the police, the woman is Esmerelda's long lost mother. And the girl dies. At the end of Huck Finn, Jim learns he was free from the start.

I accept suck happy epiphanies as gifts, and have no scheme to make them happen.