Too soon for a plot twist?

There's no such thing as "too early in the story for a plot twist". There's even a trope called "First-Episode Spoiler", for when the very beginning of a story contains a plot twist that's pivotal to the rest of the story (obligatory TV Tropes warning).

In your case, where you've got the parallel journeys, you could write them in such a way that the first hero seems virtuous and strong-willed up until his corruption, but once you read the second hero's journey, you realise just how much more virtuous and strong-willed he is in comparison. This way the first hero's journey will still come as a shock to most readers, but as they read on, they'll realise in hindsight that it's actually not all that unexpected.

posted over 5 years ago

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F1Krazy‭

195 reputation 4 73 38 0

Hero 1 goes through the gauntlet to become a hero, and it's left him bitter. He's angry at how unfair it was. How many good men died just to prove purity (or whatever). He is a hero, but he's broken.

Hero 2 goes through the gauntlet to follow in his idol's footsteps: Hero 1. He gets through the gauntlet because he keeps reminding himself about Hero 1. He's got a symbol of hope.

However you tease the "twist" to the reader that this is not going to go as planned is up to you.

Hero 2 can hear bad things about his idol and deny it. Hero 2 has to put Hero 1 on a pedestal to preserve the symbol of hope, so he willingly ignores a few bad things that the reader knows is objectively true.

Meanwhile Hero 1 has been observing Hero 2's progress and has mixed emotions. He's probably going to die a meaningless death like all the others, or emerge jaded and broken just like himself. But as he comes closer to finishing, Hero 1 is emotionally invested, maybe contemplates cheating, intervening for Hero 2…, or is he suppose to stand back dispassionately? While Hero 1 is debating it (he's a broken hero), Hero 2 sees "a vision" of Hero 1 watching over him. Hero 1 is like "oh whatever, just die" and leaves, but Hero 2 is like "Hero 1 is my guardian angel! He watched over me and knew I could make it!"

By the time Hero 2 finishes the gauntlet, the reader knows these guys have very different ideologies, and those ideologies can't survive meeting each other. 2/3rds of the novel they finally meet and readers are excited, because they are in on the "twist", but the two characters aren't.

The last 3rd of the story is how this is reconciled. Hero 2 is disillusioned when his ideology falls, but it was flawed to begin with. He's got to find his own strength, not just idol worship. Meanwhile Hero 1 has either created a self-fulfilled prophecy that the gauntlet is a bad hero-maker, or he realizes that a hero is more than winning challenges it is a symbol of hope and he has a path to redemption.

You still get the twist but it's not about tricking the reader, it's about tricking the characters.

Probably opinion-based, but consider the goal is not to "trick the reader" but to put your MC in agony and conflict. Everything they worked for and believed in up to that point is stripped away! The reader is turning pages because they know that a big reveal is coming, and they can't wait to watch this collision. Let your reader in on the twist (by stages), don't tell the characters it's coming. You get suspense which is a better build, and there's still a twist because the characters will do SOMEthing – we have no idea what – but it's more about wrecking these characters' lives.

posted over 5 years ago

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wetcircuit‭

523 reputation 24 58 96 0

I don't think you should leave the twist out, though it might be a little too soon to incorporate twist. You also should not make it clear from the beginning that the hero is corrupt, instead showing it little by little.

posted over 5 years ago

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Xilpex‭

20 reputation 3 1 3 0

Just an idea but what's to stop you from writing things out of chronological order?

The initial hero may turn villain 1/3 the way through chronologically but you could choose to write two distinct time lines, one following the initial hero's decent into villainy and one following the second hero where this time line will intercept at the climactic moment the former and latter heroes meet.

By Separating the time lines and skewing them you could have the plot twist happen at just about any place in your story.

posted over 5 years ago

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BKlassen‭

75 reputation 0 8 14 0

There is no "too soon" or "to late" for a plot twist. It's important how it's executed. They way I would try to lead to this twist is to keep him shown as a good guy. In many stories, "good" guys kill "bad" guys. But how do you know who's the good and who's the bad person? Normally this is shown by the actions of those persons to neutral characters and towards each other. If you write from the point of the "hero" you can portray his deeds as good, as he thinks they're good and rightouss But if you slowly zoom out of the view of the "hero" you can lead the reader to more and more doubt on his actions.
This will give the reader the ability to foresee a plot-twist, at least if he pays enough attention to the hints, and it gives really good approach to the question "what is good, what makes a hero?"

posted over 5 years ago

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miep‭

5 reputation 0 1 1 0

I would foreshadow the fundamental corruptibility of the hero first. He cheats at a game, gets caught, and is unrepentant. He chases and stops the robber of a rich man -- then demands half the loot to let him go, and returns to tell the victim the robber escaped him.

But at the same time, I would show him, perhaps interleaved with those scenes, actually altruistic and brave. He saves a girl about to be raped, sends the criminals packing (or injured or dead by his battle prowess), with no reward.

Part of the money he took from the robber he hands out to an old homeless woman, again just to help, without reward or exchange.

If throughout his journey you make him a mixed bag of morality, both self-interested and greedy but also moved to sympathy and altruism for the helpless, you can make sure the reader isn't certain exactly which side will surface, or prevail.

If possible, I would ensure he accomplishes his altruistic mission to defeat an evil that persecutes some innocent people, but once that is done, there is just too much wealth and power in the villain's lair for him to just walk away from it.

posted over 5 years ago

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Amadeus‭

3156 reputation 2 1399 613 37

One option is to move the twist even earlier in your story! If you want to focus primarily on Hero 2, compress Hero 1's journey into just the prologue. Not necessarily literally the first chapter, but the part of the story to set up your world before the inciting incident on Hero 2's journey.

The risk with waiting until a third of the way through the story to drop your twist is that your readers will become emotionally invested in Hero 1 and expect to go through the entire story with them. Then, well after your story is underway, you're taking Hero 1 away from your readers and suddenly asking them to follow along with an entirely different character. Pulling this switch off in the middle of a story is difficult and can easily alienate your readers.

However, dropping the twist at the beginning of your work avoids this problem. Your readers will still be looking for the main thread and won't feel betrayed by a short story to set up the main arc before meeting the main character. And a twist like Hero 1 becoming corrupted works well for this kind of short vignette. The best short stories have a twist ending, and in the context of a broader story, a prologue needs to ask a compelling question. Going on a short journey with a heroic character only for them to turn out to be evil accomplishes both of those goals wonderfully.

posted over 5 years ago

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Kevin‭

175 reputation 0 32 35 8