Agatha Christie again and again managed to make the murderer the very person you'd least expect. Hannah Gadsby so distracts her audience with deviations and brilliant meandering logic that you never see the last laugh coming. Christopher McQuarrie made theaters full of people gasp at the end of The Usual Suspects, uniting them all in that simultaneous, double-barrelled realization of: "Oh no! But of course!"
Aristotle is the first person credited with the idea that the secret to a perfect ending is that it be at once surprising and inevitable. He wrote in his Poetics that the "change of fortune" in a good story should "arise from the internal structure of the plot, so that what follows should be the necessary or probable result of the preceding action.” A story must be structured, according to this theory, of blocks building upon one another to an inevitable reveal, realization, or emotional crescendo. There's perhaps nothing more satisfying, as a reader or viewer, to be hit with a final realization that seems at once to come straight out of left field and yet feel instantly as though it was the only possible way the story, show, poem, book, or film could ever have ended.
Engineering such an ending is a delicate balance. The writer must sow enough seeds to provide the clues that will light up for the reader to illuminate this path in hindsight, but they have to tread lightly or risk making things too inevitable, thus negating the element of surprise. Different writers do this in different ways. Agatha Christie revolutionized detective fiction by self-awarely breaking the then-established rules of the genre, giving the reader insight into the murderer's inner thoughts, for example, or misdirecting the reader at multiple points in the narrative. Hannah Gadsby continues to amuse and amaze her audiences by suffusing her shows with multiple narratives, all of which culminate by being connected in surprising ways. Many use the principles of Anton Chekhov's famous gun, introducing a seemingly insignificant element early on in the work that will ultimately prove essential to the plot.
Writing Prompt: Working Backwards
We're giving you the story – it's up to you to figure out how to tell it! Let's consider the trope of the Chosen One , a hero set on a quest they never asked for. Our Chosen One is on a quest to defeat a mighty foe, and the final reveal we're working towards is that the Chosen One is, in reality, the very foe they are tasked with destroying.
How could you sow the seeds of this realization so that it is inevitable for the reader?
How could you misdirect the reader's attention so that the ending is also a surprise?
Sketch out a plot that includes your hints and misdirections, and test it out on a friend to see if they are able to guess the ending before you get there.
Things We're Reading & Opportunities
Read more about crafting the perfect ending on The Write Practice.
Consider enrolling in the Nantes Writers’ Workshop! Our next session is Monday, June 24 through to Friday, June 28, and we're accepting applications on a rolling basis.