Let's Twist Again by Nola Passmore

Photo credit: beautyfromashes / Foter/ CC BY-NC-ND

Picture this. Businessman, adult son, and work colleague go into closed room while businessman’s wife waits outside. A shot rings out. Wife enters room to discover husband dead and son grappling with work colleague. Work colleague runs from room with gun, and the rest of the novel is spent hunting the murderer.

When I read that scenario, I thought to myself, ‘Oh I bet the son turns out to be the killer’. And guess what? He was. Although the novel was well-written, with lots of suspense, the fact that I picked the twist in the first 20 pages did dampen my enthusiasm.

When I read Ian McEwan’s Atonement, I had a totally different experience. While there are some aspects of the book I didn’t enjoy, the twist is the best I’ve ever read. It turned the whole novel on its head.

So what makes a good twist?

Avoid the Obvious

There are some really well-worn plot twists that invariably let down the reader. Here are some examples.

• You follow your protagonist through an incredible series of events, only to find it was all a dream.
• The strange man you saw kissing the married woman turns out to be her brother.
• The protagonist is behaving out of character and you discover he has an identical twin.

The more original you are, the more likely you’ll create that ‘ah ha’ moment for your readers.

Work on the ‘Set Up’

While it’s important for a twist to surprise, it shouldn’t come ‘out of the blue’ or trick your readers. There needs to be some foreshadowing so that when your readers get to the big reveal, they think ‘Wow, that all makes sense now’. Kate Morton does a brilliant job of this in The Secret Keeper. The twist in itself isn’t the most unique I’ve ever come across. In fact, I read another novel recently that used a similar device. However, her plotting and foreshadowing is brilliant. While I didn’t see the twist coming, it explained everything and I felt like I wanted to go back and read the book again in light of the twist.

It Advances the Story

As K.M. Wieland notes, a plot twist shouldn’t be an end in itself. It has to contribute to the plot in a meaningful way so that readers will be excited about the ensuing developments. The twist should actually make the story better.

All of that is easier said than done of course, but if you can develop original twists that avoid gimmicks, are set up well and raise your story to the next level, you’ll have thousands of happy readers.

Which novels have you read that have great twists? I’d love to hear your suggestions (without the spoilers of course).

More Reading

Scheller, R. (2014). 4 Ways to Write a Killer Plot Twist. Retrieved from: http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/4-ways-to-write-a-killer-plot-twist

N.B. Most of this article is an excerpt from Story Trumps Structure by Steven James.

Wieland, K. M. (2013). 5 Ways to Write a Killer Plot Twist. Retrieved from http://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/5-ways-to-write-killer-plot-twist/

Nola Passmore is a freelance writer who has had more than 140 short pieces published, including devotionals, true stories, magazine articles, academic papers, poetry and short fiction.  She loves sharing what God has done in her life and encouraging others to do the same.  She and her husband Tim have their own freelance writing and editing business called The Write Flourish.  You can find her writing tips blog at their website: http://www.thewriteflourish.com.au

How to Have Originality

by Charis Joy Jackson

                       “Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality 
          will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring two 
            pence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become 
                                           original without ever having noticed it.”
                                                                                                                    - C.S. Lewis

I want to be original.

Who doesn’t?

As an artist, I paint pictures with words and words are awesome. They invoke emotions and take us on wild adventures through time, space and alternate realities.

They remind us of what’s important.

Sometimes, though, those words seem traitorous. My magical fingers will weave a tale and lo and behold when I read back my masterpiece I discover something. It’s not original. The story’s already been told.

Alas.

Once, I created this character who was sure to warm the readers’ hearts. He was a doctor, or in his world a “healer”. He was a small character, but still needed the perfect name, so I popped over to one of my favourite writing resources babynames.com and found one so perfect it actually meant “healer”. About a month later I picked up a book by one of my favourite authors and discovered he had used the same name!

Not just that, but the character was the same. EXACTLY.

ENTIRELY.

I was crushed. If I ever got it published it’d look like I’d stolen the character.

After beating my head against the wall for a bit I came to another conclusion. I was growing as a writer. If I could come up with a great character, like my favourite author, then I’d come up with more. Yes. Success.

I also discovered the quote above.

Personally, I believe the fear of not being original lays at the foundation of writers block. Think about it. How many times have you opened a fresh document and instead of filling it with all the goodness waiting inside your head, you just stare at it?

Stop staring!

Each of us are an original and so are our stories.

How about we take the lead from our good friend Clive and say, “I don’t care two pence how often it has been told before. I’m still gonna tell it!”

Now stop reading this. Go write.

Charis Joy Jackson is working as a missionary with Youth With a Mission (YWAM) a non-profit organization & is part of The Initiative Production Company. She loves creating stories & is currently writing a novel, which she hopes to create into a seven part series.

Here's to a life lived in awe & wonder.
Welcome to the adventure.
www.charisjoyjackson.com

Easter - The Same Old Story? by Nola Passmore

When Monica Andermann asked a friend to church on Easter Sunday, her friend replied ‘No thanks … I’ve heard that story before.  I know how it ends’.  Do you ever feel like you’ve heard it all before?  It’s easy to become complacent about well-known Bible stories, especially when you’ve been around Christian circles for a long time.  If I’m in a church service and the minister announces that we’re going to look at The Prodigal Son or the Parable of the Sower, I groan inwardly.  ‘Not that one again.’  How sad is that though?  How sad to lose our wonder at the amazing things God has done on our behalf. 

At Easter we celebrate all that Christ did for us on the cross.  How phenomenal is it that God sent His Son to die for our sins so we could spend eternity with Him?  God’s word is just as ‘alive and active’ as it was 2000 years ago (Hebrews 4:12).  However, I think part of our challenge as Christian writers is to communicate Biblical truth in fresh ways.  How could we do that with the Easter story?

A few years ago, our minister invited the congregation to read a book of devotions by Walter Wangerin Jr. for the 40 days leading up to Easter.  I bought a copy of Reliving the Passion thinking that it would all be pretty familiar to me.  However, it was more than a set of devotions.  It was told with drama, dialogue, internal monologues and great emotion.  As I read each day’s entry, I was able to look into the thoughts of Peter and Mary Magdalene.  I was able to see and hear what was going on and it helped me to gain fresh insights.  Here’s a sample based on Mark 15:1 after Jesus has been delivered to Pilate:

Jesus, how do you feel?  What are you thinking?  You don’t talk.  Your mouth has been closed for such a long time now.  Last night, before the legal machinery caught hold of you and began to grind you in its wheels, you said your soul was sorrowful, even unto death—and then your eyes revealed the grief.  I saw it.  But now, in the dawn of your deathday, your face is expressionless.  I can read nothing in your eyes.  Jesus!  Jesus!  How do you feel right now?  What moods contend within you?  What worlds collide inside your soul?  O Jesus, are you hating?  Are you praying?  Are you screaming silently?  Are you thinking about me now? (p. 94)

Singer-songwriter Don Francisco also used first person in his classic song He’s Alive which is written from Peter’s perspective.  Through the lyrics, we see Peter move from doubt to hope to belief as he sees the empty tomb and later encounters the risen Lord face to face.  The song always gives me goose bumps.  To listen to it, click here.

I tried my hand at a ‘different’ kind of Easter poem by writing from the perspective of Barabbas, the criminal released at Passover in the place of Jesus.  There’s not a lot of information about Barabbas in the Bible, so I had to try to imagine how he would have felt.  I took the perspective that he may have thought they were leading him out to be crucified, but instead he found himself a free man.  To read it, click here.

  

As you contemplate what Jesus has done for us this Easter, try looking at it with fresh eyes and meditate on how amazing his sacrifice of love was both then and now.  If you were going to write a story, song, poem, script or devotion about Easter, how could you give it an original spin?  Or perhaps you’ve already written something along those lines.  I’d be interested in hearing your thoughts.

References

Andermann, M. A.  (2014).  Same old story.  In M. Nutter (Ed.), Penned from the heart (vol. 21, p. 57).  New Wilmington, PA: Son-Rise Publications.

Wangerin, W., Jr.  (1992).  Reliving the passion.  Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

Nola Passmore is a freelance writer who has had more than 140 short pieces published, including devotions, true stories, magazine articles, academic papers, poetry and short fiction.  She loves sharing what God has done in her life and encouraging others to do the same.  She and her husband Tim have their own freelance writing and editing business called The Write Flourish.  You can find her weekly writing tips blog at their website: http://www.thewriteflourish.com.au

The Fresh and the Familiar

One of the first assignments in my creative writing course involved a set of four poems.  I fancied myself as a bit of a poet, so I was pretty confident I’d nailed it.  The lecturer rang to give me feedback and was very positive about two of the poems.  However, the other two were not as original as they could have been.  As he explained what he meant, I realised that I had used some well-worn phrases and ideas (e.g., God lavishing grace on us and people wearing emotional masks to hide how they really feel).  He encouraged me to look for the original thread that would take them out of the ordinary.  After revision, one of them was published in an American poetry journal.  I’ve never forgotten that advice and try to inject it into all of my writing projects.  I don’t always hit the mark, but I know that when I do strike that chord of originality, the whole piece sings.

After using parables to teach his disciples, Jesus said that “every teacher of the law who has become a disciple in the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old” (Matthew 13:52, NIV).  In the Amplified Bible, that last phrase is translated “the fresh as well as the familiar”.  What a great goal for Christian writers. 

So how do we inject originality into our writing? 

• Read, read, read.  One problem with that poetry assignment was that I had hardly read any poetry since leaving school, which was … ahem … a long time ago.  I didn’t know what people were writing, I didn’t know how styles had changed, and I didn’t know where to send material. If you read more in the genre that you’re writing, you not only find out what’s already been done, but you also pick up great tips for improving your own writing.

• Look for a fresh angle or perspective.  One trick I’ve used in poetry is to write from the point of view of a different character.  I’ve had poems published from the perspectives of Rahab, Barabbas, Sapphira, Joseph the father of Jesus, and the woman who touched Jesus’ cloak.  I’m sure I’m not the first person to have written poetry about these people, but by taking a different angle, it automatically puts your work into a smaller pool and hopefully brings fresh insights to a familiar story.

• Chart new territory.  In some ways, “there is nothing new under the sun” (Ecc. 1:9), but we can look for new ways of expressing it.  For example, if you’re writing a crime novel, we already know that there will be a variety of suspects and a swag of red herrings before the murderer is revealed at the end.  What can you do to make the journey through that path more interesting?  What if your sleuth isn’t a detective, an FBI agent or a forensic pathologist, but a precocious 11-year-old amateur chemist who lives on the crumbling estate of Buckshaw in 1950s England?  Alan Bradley did that to great effect in his highly original Flavia de Luce series.  What will be your novel’s unique mark?

• Pray and spend time in the Word.  Although I’ve left it until last, this is the most important point.  God is the master of originality.  If He created the world, surely He can give us great ideas and insights for our own writing.  As you spend time in the scriptures, ask Him to show you a fresh angle for a devotion, an original way of progressing your novel or an interesting theme for a poem.  After all, He’s never out of ideas.

 

Nola Passmore is a freelance writer who has had more than 90 short pieces published in various magazines, journals, and anthologies (including true stories, devotions, poetry and short fiction). She has a passion for writing about what God has done in her life and encouraging others to do the same. (Some call it "nagging", but she calls it "encouragement").