Foreshadowing by Rebecca Seaton

 

Foreshadowing 

by Rebecca Seaton

Ominous?

What is foreshadowing?

Foreshadowing is a warning or indication of future events. It’s hints or clues at things that will happen later in a story, often symbolically. It’s the subtle hint that makes sense later on.

Why bother to do it?

This strategy engage our reader and credits them with a bit of brain power as developments become evident over time. It should be noted that this relies on using commonly understood events, symbols etc. The real goal, I think, of foreshadowing, is to create the perfect ‘Oh, of course!’ moment at the end of the book. This is particularly easy to explain in crime fiction, although it applies to other genres too. When the crime novel ends with a big reveal (Commonly the identity of the murderer but sometimes other secrets coming to light), we don’t want the reader to think, ‘Well, duh!’ because that means our writing has been too obvious, we haven’t foreshadowed anything, we’ve hit them over the head with it from page 1.* You also don’t want ‘What?!’ In this case, the murderer is so unlikely you’d be mad to guess them. Agatha Christie went through a phase of these. Roger Ackroyd, anyone?! If there’s the ‘Oh…’ type reaction, you’ve got it right. They didn’t guess, but they feel they should have.

How?

A common way is to use weather. Your happy lovers may be saying all the right things as they walk through the forest hand in hand but the rolling clouds tell the reader (or viewer) this isn’t going to end well. Is that thunder I hear? It’s been nice knowing you…

Casual conversation and observations might give us clues as well. Even better if the characters don’t realise the importance of what they’ve said. Someone comments on a girl being greedy, it doesn’t seem significant to the characters but the reader starts thinking – six chapters later, she declares she’s pregnant.

Symbols can be useful but they must make sense to your reader. Maybe you want to surprise your reader with a nasty character who makes good in the end. You don’t want it to be a complete surprise so you use a name like Goodman. Or it’s symbolic  – the character who gets a plastic ring in their cracker turns out to be the heir to the throne. There are some really good examples in books and films – take a look at Unbreakable for sheer ‘I could kick myself’ final revelations.

Look at the ending of one of your favourite stories. Go back and see if you can spot the foreshadowing. After that, the only thing left to do is try for yourself. Start off by injecting some interesting weather into a scene. Will your readers say ‘Oh, of course…’ at the end? If not, try some foreshadowing and give them a hint.

 

* unless your audience is my mum – she always knows, it’s not you.

 

Rebecca Seaton came second place in the 2017-18 Pen to Print Book Challenge with her YA fantasy, A Silent Song, which explores issues of faith, forgiveness and belonging. She is currently working on her second novel.

 

 #amwriting #amwritingfantasy #ACW