Plotting Surprises and Mysteries Worksheets

What do you know that your reader doesn’t?

At the start of the story, everything.

But surprises and mysteries are built from misdirection — from allowing (or helping) your reader to assume things that are not true, to jump to incorrect conclusions, to look at the wrong pieces of evidence or the wrong suspects first, and to otherwise gently help your reader to follow the wrong paths so that you can break out the right path at the right time, and delight your reader with your cool surprise.