Let’s begin bluntly with the point of this blog: I worry sometimes that my obsession with building stories with depth and plots that pay out long-term is working against me.

If you’ve read more than one of my longform stories, you’ve unquestionably noticed by now that I like to bring something up in one chapter and either twist its meaning or reveal what it was about in a later chapter. I do it… pretty constantly. In some ways this isn’t a bad thing, as it allows meaning to build over time, rewards readers for paying attention, and causes additional understanding on a second read. Plus, it’s fun! It’s fun, even when one knows a twist is coming, to go all, “Ooh, what’s the twist, what’s the twist…?”

This strategy comes with several downfalls though. Number one, it can make my stories a tad formulaic. Number two, if you don’t like the whole “Ooh, a character is hiding something, and in four months I guess I’ll find out what it is” thing, I can obviously understand. It might even be annoying to see that over and over in a completed story if you don’t like that particular trope, so to see it and know the next chapter is a long way away can be frustrating.

Of course, if you like that kind of story (and likely you do, since you’re reading this blog), it can be titillating. Maybe the month-long break is even part of the fun if you’re a masochist. Some of my readers like to play detective, and some just like being along for the ride without even needing to guess.

And hey – sometimes I genuinely don’t have a plan. Sometimes I randomly remember a line of dialogue from two chapters ago and go, “Oh… ha, what if they said this but meant it another way? That’s neat, I’m going to try that out.” Some stories I plan out and some stories I wing. Not to mention, these are story-based sex stories. If things didn’t build one way or another, I worry about becoming – no offense to them – yet another “””story”””-based sex writer that pretends to write stories but writes sex scenes and needs to curtain them with basic plots. I don’t want my stories to be pointless, and of course stories aren’t pointless if they don’t obviously build to some climax that recontextualizes previous chapters, but… shoot me, it’s my favorite way to make a story.

Another defense of my style is the two-pronged blade of “this happens in real life all the time” and “stories don’t reflect that enough.” All the time you find out that two people you knew independently of each other were secretly dating, or you overheard someone say something innocent to someone and found out later what they really meant or something. (And if it doesn’t happen that often to you, trust me, it’s most likely because you weren’t fortunate enough to witness the reveal moment.) Stories reflect this sometimes, but I think we like to trust the information we get is the information we need. I like to play with that in the same way I’ve seen reality do time and time again. It’s fun, but it’s also a healthy reflection of what happens often enough in the real world.

That said… it sets a trap. The trap became obvious to me after finishing writing Follow the Leader and not being happy with its execution: if you center a plot around said reveal, and it doesn’t quite stick the landing, the whole piece suffers. If you centers basically all aspects of a story around this reveal and the payoff isn’t enough, then definitionally, the story wasn’t quite worth it. That’s a bitter pill to swallow. It’s even more bitter knowing that this could happen with any story I write that uses this strategy. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy with some reveals, even cheesy ones or ones some readers could spot a mile away – without getting spoiler-y, the reveal about Zelda around halfway through Consequences comes to mind.

That said: it’s important to note the context there. Consequences has a fully stacked deck. It’s a popular story that people already clearly liked, filled with such relatively beloved characters of mine that people were already asking for a sequel to that story for years. Consequences pretty much constantly has several plots going at once, with characters’ stories weaving in and out of each others’ lives, constantly being affected by every interaction they have. Character-wise, it’s a very… dynamic-feeling story. Heck, the reveal happens in a chapter that was deliberately written differently than the whole rest of the book, in a way people seemed to like. I can’t just act like the twist/reveal happens in a vacuum and leave it there.

I am clearly, clearly not done with these twists and reveals that retroactively change previous chapters. Some will really hit home, and some will flop. I need to accept that, but I also need to structure my stories in such a way that if a reveal flops, it won’t ruin the whole story. It’s food for thought. And hey… maybe someday I’ll write a longform story without resorting to a reveal at all. Wouldn’t that be the day? I hope you enjoy Final Answer Chapter 11, and I’ll talk to you again soon.

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