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Foreshadowing is a necessary part of any well-executed story. And yet, despite all its prevalence and importance, it’s actually a concept that many authors have a hard time getting their minds around. If we sift foreshadowing down to its simplest form, we could say that it prepares readers for what will happen later in the story.

At first glance, this may seem counter-intuitive. Why would we want readers to know what’s going to happen later in the story? If they know how the book turns out, they’ll have no reason to read on.

True enough. So let me reiterate. The point of foreshadowing is to prepare readers for what happens later in the story. Not tell them,just prepare them.

Foreshadowing’s great strength lies in its ability to create a cohesive and plausible story. If readers understand that it’s possible that someone in your story may be murdered, they won’t be completely shocked when the sidekick gets axed down the road. If, however, you failed to properly foreshadow this unhappy event,readers would be jarred. They would feel you had cheated them out of the story they thought they were reading. They would think you had, in essence, lied to them so you could trick them with this big shocker.

Readers don’t like to be cheated, lied to, or tricked. And that’s where foreshadowing comes into play.

Foreshadowing, Part 1: The Plant

We can break foreshadowing down into two parts. The first is the plant. This is the part where you hint to readers that something surprising and/or important is going to happen later in the book. If the bad guy is going to kidnap the good guy’s son, your plant might be the moment when your hero notices a creepy dude hanging around the playground. If your heroine is going to be left standing at the altar, your plant might be her fiancé’s ambivalence toward the wedding preparations.

Depending on what you’re foreshadowing, the plant can be blatant or subtle. Subtle is almost always better, since you don’t want to giveaway your plot twists. But, at the same time, your hints have to be obvious enough that readers will remember them later on.

Usually, the earlier you can foreshadow an event, the stronger and more cohesive an effect you will create. The bigger the event, the more important it is to foreshadow it early. As editor Jeff Gerke puts it in The First 50 Pages:

Basically, you need to let us in on the rules. If the climax of your book is going to consist of getting into a time machine and jumping away to safety, we had better have known in the first fifty pages that time travel is possible in the world of your story.

Foreshadowing, Part 2: The Payoff

Once you’ve got your plant in place, all that’s left is to bringthe payoff on stage. If you planted hints about kidnapping, jilting, or time travelling, this is the part where you now get to let these important scenes play out.

As long as you’ve done your job right with the plant, you probably won’t even need to reference your hints from earlier. In fact, you’re likely to create a more solid effect by letting readers put the pieces together themselves.

But you’ll also find moments, usually of smaller events that were given less obvious plants, that will benefit from a quick reference to the original hint (e.g., “George,you big meanie! Now I understand why you wouldn’t choose between the scarlet and the crimson for the bridesmaids’ dresses!”)The most important thing to remember about the payoff is that it always needs to happen. If you plant hints, pay them off. Just as readers will be confused by an unforeshadowed plot twist, they’ll also be frustrated by foreshadowing that excites them and then leads nowhere.

Foreshadowing vs. Telegraphing

The trick to good foreshadowing is preparing your readers on a subconscious level for what’s coming without allowing them to guess the ins and outs of the plot twist. You don’t want your hints to be so obvious that they remove all suspense. In her October 2012 Writer’s Digest article “Making the Ordinary Menacing: 5 Ways,” Hallie Ephron calls this “telegraphing”:

When you insert a hint of what’s to come, look at it critically and decide whether it’s something the reader will glide right by but remember later with an Aha!That’s foreshadowing. If instead the reader groans and guesses what’s coming, you’v etelegraphed.

Some clever readers will undoubtedly be able to interpret your hints, no matter how cagey you are. But if you can fool most of the readers most of the time, you can’t ask for more than that.

Foreshadowing vs. Foreboding

Foreboding—that skin-prickling feeling that somethinghorrible is going to happen—can be a useful facet of foreshadowing. By itself, foreboding isn’t specific enough tobe foreshadowing. Unlike the plants used for foreshadowing, foreboding is just an ambiguous aura of suspense. Jordan E. Rosenfeld describes it in Make a Scene:

[F]oreshadowing … hints at actual plot events to come, [but]foreboding is purely about mood-setting. It heightens the feeling of tension in a scene but doesn’t necessarily indicate that something bad really will happen.

Foreboding is useful in setting readers’ emotions on edge without giving them any blatant hints. But when it comes time to foreshadow important events, always back up your foreboding by planting some specific clues.Most authors have so intrinsic an understanding of foreshadowing that they plant it and pay it off without even fully realizing that’s what they’re doing. But the better you understand the technique, the better you can wield it. Using this basic approach to foreshadowing, you can strengthen your story and your readers’ experience of it.

Disrupt the reader’s sense of justice. 

This generally means setting a character up to deserve one thing and then giving them the exact opposite. 

Kill a character off before they can achieve their goal. 

Let the bad guy get an extremely important win. 

Set up a coup against a tyrannical king. The coup fails miserably.

Don’t always give characters closure. 

(Excluding the end of the book, obviously)

A beloved friend dies in battle and there’s no time to mourn him.

A random tryst between two main characters is not (or cannot be) brought up again.

A character suddenly loses their job or can otherwise no longer keep up their old routine

Make it the main character’s fault sometimes. 

And not in an “imposter syndrome” way. Make your MC do something bad, and make the blame they shoulder for it heavy and tangible.

MC must choose the lesser of two evils.

MC kills someone they believe to be a bad guy, only to later discover the bad guy was a different person altogether.

Rejection is a powerful tool. 

People generally want to be understood, and if you can make a character think they are Known, and then rip that away from them with a rejection (romantic or platonic) people will empathize with it.

MC is finally accepting the Thing They Must Do/Become, and their love interest decides that that’s not a path they want to be on and breaks up with them

MC makes a decision they believe is right, everyone around them thinks they chose wrong.

MC finds kinship with someone Like Them, at long last, but that person later discovers that there is some inherent aspect of MC that they wholly reject. (Perhaps it was MC’s fault that their family member died, they have important religious differences, or WERE THE BAD GUY ALL ALONG!)

On the flipside, make your main character keep going. 

Push them beyond what they are capable of, and then push them farther. Make them want something so deeply that they are willing to do literally anything to get it. Give them passion and drive and grit and more of that than they have fear.

“But what if my MC is quiet and meek?” Even better. They want something so deeply that every single moment they push themselves toward it is a moment spent outside their comfort zone. What must that do to a person?

Obviously, don’t do all of these things, or the story can begin to feel tedious or overly dramatic, and make sure that every decision you make is informed by your plot first and foremost. 

AKA How to Enjoy Writing for the Sake of it

Get off social media! I know it’s tempting to blabber on about a WIP to get those hella cool notes, but doing so only reinforces that writing’s only fun if it gets you attention. We all need that boost now and again, but too much of it will whittle away your self-reliance. Close your laptop, leave your phone in a different room, and sit down with a notebook if possible and if you need to. You’ll get to know what enthralls you personally about your story.

Don’t write for an audience for now. Tumblr likes to do this thing where it says “blah blah blah X is problematic in media” and while it’s well-intentioned, internalizing too much of this can make you feel like you’re trying to write through a maze and constantly failing at it. Forget about your audience–you can flag and catch problematic stuff in edits after tossing it to the betas.

Remember what made thirteen-year-old you lose their mind? Yeah, write that. Once you’ve let go of writing for an audience, you won’t worry about being “cringey” anymore, and that’s when things start to get real good and real fun. You don’t have to show your writing to anyone, or even tell them you wrote it, so just go buckwild! Trust me, it’s so liberating.

Your inner critic is useful–but not now. Shut that bitch up! Your job when drafting is to make something. If you did that, you win, so your critic’s opinion is worth squat here. However, if you try to fight her {I always envision mine as some bitchy middle-aged woman lol} she’s just gonna get louder. So tell yourself you can be as critical of your writing as you want during edits. You’re not working for perfect, or even good right now. You’re working for existing.

A zero draft is similar to a first draft but represents something psychologically different.  Zero drafts relieve the pressure to uphold a certain level of quality a writer might expect in a first draft. Often, zero drafts are written quickly and without completion. In this way, they bridge between an outline and a more refined draft.

For me, zero drafts allow exploration without commitment. I can extend my outline into something more tangible. Through this, I expose walls, plot holes, missing scenes, and extraneous characters. Because I use zero drafts more to test plot and characters, it is conducive to fast drafting. I know any issues I find can be fixed later and the quicker I complete this version, the quicker I can build something from the base I’ve laid.

5 Tips to Draft Quickly

Plan writing time

Writing a lot of words in a short amount of time requires dedication. If you write whenever the mood strikes you, it is unlikely you will achieve your goals. You are allowed to schedule breaks, but avoid taking more than two days off in a row.

Set deadlines

Knowing when the draft needs to be complete is more of a push than just completing is “quickly”. You can set 4 months, 4 weeks, or lengths in between depending on how seasoned you are at fast drafting.

Beyond a project deadline, daily or weekly goals will help you to monitor progress so you can adjust your process as you go.

Plan your story (at least a little)

You do not have to have a Roman numeral outline with 5 levels of depth. However, if you plan nothing, you will likely hit a wall that will break your flow. I recommend planning the following at minimum:

Main character(s)

Beginning

Overarching conflict and/or main antagonist

2-3 intermediate conflicts

Ending (optional)

Write with flow

Write however the words come. You don’t have to describe characters or setting if it doesn’t come in the moment. Likewise, you can describe in excruciating detail and cut it later. You can use placeholders, skip scenes, and write out of order. Anything that keeps you adding to the word count, do it. It can and will be fixed later. The faster you write, the faster you can edit.

Add accountability

Accountability can come internally or externally.

Internally:

Track daily word counts

Reward when you hit a milestone (chapter, word count, page count)

Externally:

Post on social media whether you hit a goal

Tell a friend

Embarrass your protagonist. Make them seem weak and vulnerable in some way.

Shoot someone. That always takes the reader by surprise. 

In relation, kidnap someone. Or, rather, make it seem to your protagonist like someone has been kidnapped. 

Have one of your side characters disappear or become unavailable for some reason. This will frustrate your protagonist.

Have someone kiss the wrong girl, boy, or person, especially if you’ve been setting up a romance angle. It’s annoying.

If this story involves parents, have them argue. Push the threat of divorce, even if you know it won’t ever happen. It’ll make your readers nervous.

Have someone frame your protagonist for a crime they didn’t commit. This could range from a dispute to a minor crime to a full-blown felony.

If this is a fantasy story involving magic or witchcraft, create a terrible accident that’s a direct result of their spell-casting. 

Injure your protagonist in some way, or push them into a treacherous scenario where they might not make it out alive. 

Have two side characters who are both close to the protagonist get into a literal fist-fight. This creates tension for the reader, especially if these characters are well-developed, because they won’t know who to root for.

Make your protagonist get lost somewhere (at night in the middle of town, in the woods, in someone else’s house, etc.) 

Involve a murder. It can be as in-depth and as important as you want it to be. 

Introduce a new character that seems to prey on your protagonist’s flaws and bring them out to light.

If it’s in-character, have one of your characters get drunk or take drugs. Show the fallout of that decision through your protagonist. 

Spread a rumor about your protagonist. 

If your protagonist is in high-school, create drama in the school atmosphere. A death of a student, even if your protagonist didn’t know them personally, changes the vibe. 

If your story involves children, have one of them do something dangerous (touch a hot stove, run out into the road, etc.) and show how the protagonist responds to this, even if the child isn’t related to them. 

In a fantasy story, toss out the idea of a rebellion or war between clans or villages (or whatever units you are working with). 

Add a scenario where your protagonist has to make a choice. We all have watched movies where we have screamed don’t go in there! at the top of our lungs at the main character. Make them go in there. 

Have your protagonist find something, even if they don’t understand the importance of it yet. A key, a document, an old stuffed animal, etc. 

Foreshadow later events in some way. (Need help? Ask me!)

Have your protagonist get involved in some sort of verbal altercation with someone else, even if they weren’t the one who started it. 

Let your protagonist get sick. No, but really, this happens in real life all the time and it’s rarely ever talked about in literature, unless it’s at its extremes. It could range from a common cold to pneumonia. Maybe they end up in the hospital because of it. Maybe they are unable to do that one thing (whatever that may be) because of it.

Have someone unexpected knock on your protagonist’s door. 

Introduce a character that takes immediate interest in your protagonist’s past, which might trigger a flashback.

Have your protagonist try to hide something from someone else and fail.

Formulate some sort of argument or dispute between your protagonist and their love interest to push them apart. 

Have your protagonist lose something of great value in their house and show their struggle to find it. This will frustrate the reader just as much as the protagonist.

Create a situation where your protagonist needs to sneak out in the middle of the night for some reason.

what did they like about each other when they met?

what do they like about each other now?

what didn’t they like about each other when they met?

what don’t they like about each other now?

what does each wish the other knew?

if someone asked one who the other was, what label would they use? (ex. my friend? my ex? the girl my friends are friends with?)

how would each person describe the other?

if one were to die tomorrow, what regrets would the other have?

is each of them satisfied with their relationship? why or why not?

what is keeping them in this relationship?

The Red Herring is a writing tool in which the writer purposely dangles a clue or a suspect before the reader in an attempt at misleading them from the answer to a mystery. This clue is meant to sidetrack the reader from what is really going on in the narrative.

What exactly is a Red Herring?

As we said above, it is a trick to mislead the reader. Say there is a murder of a wealthy woman and there are three suspects: her husband, her lover & her servant. The husband acts edgy throughout the narrative, is shown to be jealous and quick to anger. The reader begins to suspect it was the husband who murdered his wife. While the reader is sizing up the hubby, nobody is watching the servant and the lover.

How to Write a Red Herring

The concept of a perfect Red Herring is playing on the preconceptions and prejudices of the audience. The audience excepts a certain suspect to every crime and a clue to turn out to be the key of the mystery. You have to think of the reader as a cat playing with a lazer. They will follow the path you place before them because they trust you (horrible mistake I know). Some helpful things to keep in mind:

The red herring is innocent. You must remember that. Don't trap yourself into writing the RH into the corner. The reveal will not work.

On the other hand, the guilty party should not be completely clean and innocent until they are reveal to be the villain/impor. The true reveal should never come out of nowhere.

Remember the prejudices of your audience. For example every crime show on TV has the husband the first suspect whenever a woman is killed.

Your clues do not have to be bloody knives and ill intentions. Clever clues such as scents left behind after a crime or the way a character speaks about the incident should also be used.

Other characters are a good device. If Character B thinks Character A is acting shady, the audience maybe swayed by the notion. After all we trust in our narrators, biased or not.

You must ask yourself: what does the reader expect?

Examples of Excellent Red Herrings

In Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan, Carter overhears the villain, Set, speaking French to a minion which leads both Carter and the reader to suspect Desjardins- the only French speaker in the narrative.

In Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban, we suspect like every one in the narrative that Sirius Black is the antagonist. He is an escapee from a notorious wizard prison, convicted of multiple murders and his first appearances are rather dramatic. With everyone watching the convicted murderer, nobody is watching the rat.

In A Song of Ice and Fire, we are lead to believe that Cersei Lannister murdered Jon Arryn. She is certainly capable of it as well as having a strong motive. While looking at the very likely suspect of Cersei and the obvious motives, we are not seeing another murderer and another murderer. It was Littlefinger & Lysa, to "save" Sweet Robin/ begin the War of the Five Kings.

I see a lot of posts about how people will read an amazing book and feel like they’ll never be able to do anything like it, and it completely discourages them. I’ll admit, it’s really difficult as an unestablished writer to picture yourself writing something as amazing as what you’ve just read, but the important thing to remember is that these amazing pieces can build the foundation of your own work, and that reading these things is to your own advantage. Some important questions to keep in mind while reading are:

What is the author including that I’m not? Is there anything in their prose that startles you? a phrase you wouldn’t use, an unexpected flow of a scene, an atmosphere to their story that you haven’t seen used in a particular genre, etc. These things are all yours to weigh for their usefulness in your own work. 

What do they describe first? This can set the tone of the entire piece, and is great in establishing atmosphere, and even bigger themes of the book. More than that, first descriptions can be strong lasting images for the reader when used effectively. Lasting images of the piece help create a stronger emotional resonance. 

How does the author introduce characterization? Some authors use small moments of actions, the character’s own narrative voice, other characters’s interactions with them or opinions of them, contrast between characters, and even outright stating characterization (which can be insanely effective and elegant in certain styles). It’s important to recognize how the author in question does this, especially when it’s distinctly resonant with you. This is an open foundation for you to build your own characterization on. 

Are they more sentimental or cynical? This is mostly the scale of measure I use when analysing an author’s voice. Overall, they’ll usually swing to one side of things. But more importantly, try to look at the overall blend of the two, and how the voice tends to shift to either one while writing certain scenes, or characters. Often, either one could be used to contrast, add to characterization (such as with a pov), denote a change in setting (effectively shifting atmospheres), etc.