I’ve been doing a lot of wide ranging reading as a reviewer for TangentOnline. From time to time I’ll try to pass on what I’ve noticed that works or doesn’t work for me as a reader.
Today we will tackle the false surprise.
Surprise endings are popular with readers, at least according to an informal survey among my friends who consider themselves readers.
I’ve also been told surprise endings in short stories are popular with editors. Word o’ warning: I’ve never heard this from a living, breathing editor.
Still, surprise is a technique you can use to ramp up the voltage at the end of story. There are a number of ways of generating the feeling of surprise in the reader. The one I’m dealing with this evening is “false surprise.”
If surprise arises from a frame shift, a new understanding of material that is already familiar, “false surprise” arises from new material presented out of tempo. New material is introduced so close to the ending the reader doesn’t really have time to assimilate it or the implications before the story is over.
“He woke up and it was all a dream.” is an example of “false surprise,” as is a murder mystery in which clues are available to the sleuth that are not available to the reader.
Surprise gives the reader an “Aha!” reaction. “False surprise” leaves the reader with an “Huh?” reaction which is easily confused by most readers with the “Aha!” of genuine surprise. Both give a little adrenaline jolt.
Fiction is the business of lying for the sake of the reader’s enjoyment so any technique that works is both valid and valuable when correctly used. However, there is a trade off.
“Satisfying endings” depend upon material the reader is familiar with–it was presented at or near the beginning of the story, has been consistently worked with and elaborated throughout the story–arriving at a climax that the reader was probably able to guess at but still enjoyed because of an intellectual or emotional sense of rightness and completion.
Because the “false surprise” effect depends on revealing material right at the climax, it is mutually exclusive to a “satisfying ending” because the material that creates the surprise is discontinuous at an emotional or intellectual level with all of the material that has come before.
It does work. It’s a valid technique. I think it is most appropriate for patching fundamentally flawed work. But it doesn’t make for stories that are memorable.
The examples I’ve read were all print. I’d love to find some that are online. If anyone had links to suggest, I’d appreciate it, either for examples where “false surprise” worked or where it didn’t.
Best regards,
Alan