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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/37766
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/37766
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Stories run on anticipation. A reader keeps reading because the anticipate that certain things are going to happen, and that we are making progress towards those things happening. By and large, the reader reads on because they anticipate the enjoyment of watching those thing happen, and thus enjoy the anticipation itself. When the reader finds a story boring it is because they don't anticipate anything happening that is likely to interest them.

Good writing, therefore, is about creating and maintaining that sense of anticipation and then following through and delivering what was anticipated.

A red herring creates a false anticipation. It suggests that A is going to happen, but B happens instead. There is no special technique for creating red herrings. You simply tell the story as if it were leading up to A happening. But then you twist the story and have B happen instead.

The perils of red herrings should be obvious. If the reader is anticipating A, and their pleasure in reading depends on the anticipation that A will happen, then the sudden discovery that A is not going to happen can come as a great disappointment and can lead them to stop reading and give the book a one star review on Amazon.

For the red herring (which is to say, the plot twist) to work, the reader who was expecting A has to be delighted to find that B happens instead. If you lead them to anticipate hamburger and then serve them steak, you will have some happy readers. If you lead them to anticipate steak and then serve them tofu, you will have some very unhappy readers.

Original score: 14