: Re: Misdirection for suspense/plot twists - what's acceptable and what's dishonest? Note: I'm primarily asking this question because while Surtsey, the original asker of the question didn't actually

@Mendez196

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I think the line is subjective, and relates to whether the typical reader will feel like the narrator (that is not the author) cheated or tried to trick them.

Of course the author tried to trick them, that isn't the point. It is if the narrator did. So if you are writing 3rd person omniscient, the narrator knows everything, and pretty much all deception is off limits. Perhaps the narrator can give a cryptic clue, like "Mary did not know how wrong she was," but then the reader knows Mary's perception is wrong, the omniscient narrator is not lying by omission and letting the reader believe Mary's logic was sound.

If you are writing 1st person, or 3rdP Limited, then the narrator only knows what the POV character knows, so deceptions have wide range. But then, the stumbling block becomes plausibility, the MC(s) that are deceived must have plausible reasons for being deceived. It can't just sound good and understandable at the point of deception, it must still sound good and understandable after the reveal. It can't seem like "this character would never fall for that." If the reader goes back and reads the scene where the MC was deceived, knowing the MC is being deceived and how, the reader must still finish saying "Okay yeah, that could happen, and this sounds like the MC."

My favorite example of this is "The Sixth Sense." I watched it as soon as it came out, and did not expect the twist. But I also watched it again, immediately, and ... sure enough, every clue was there throughout the film, and I just missed it. There isn't a single instance where MNS cheats us, it is just done so well that we miss the clues that were in plain sight.

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