Make Your Story an Onion

No, not indecipherable satire or a tearjerker, although your story might benefit from those too. This time, I'm talking layers. Layers and layers and layers of delicious plot building.

Building those Easter eggs isn't something most people can do effortlessly. Sometimes you have a juicy joke, an unfolding revelation, but the actual art of tucking away those gems of continuing stories can be a tough feat to pull off.

It can also be a clever way to act like you meant to do something that you originally kind of just threw in there. 

Here goes my attempt to help you find those hidden gems and run with it!

The Recurring Minor Character (The Minor Resolution)

Let's make this a comedic example. You've got your main characters in some multilevel hideout and they hear the noise of some guards coming along so they wait it out and end up picking up the end of a really lame conversation.

"It wasn't a dragon, you moron, it was a horse."

"You think I don't know the difference between a dragon and a horse?"

"I think you wouldn't know your mother's mouth from a dog's anus."

"And I'm telling you it was a dragon!"

And you never see them again. Right? While at the time, that moment might have been comedic relief or even a hostage situation for the unfortunate MCs, it may be worth filing for later.

There are many ways you can go with this, but maybe a dragon bursts into the sky and the guy is elbowing his agape friend and proudly confirming he saw a dragon... Or he's just a drunk trying to steal an MC's horse while calling it a dragon (and talking to its hind end at that).

It's a silly example, but if you find that the world starts to feel too sparse, introducing a crowd element through minor facts can be a great way to reward the reader for paying attention.

The Insignificant Object

I believe I actually used an apple as an example in a previous post, but I'll go ahead and play that out again. At one point, you might have a character who seems fixated on a piece of fruit. It probably seems like a frivolous detail and when asked, they might even make an offhand remark that they didn't know apples grew here.

Even if that detail seemed annoying at the time, somewhere down the line, there comes an emotional moment. At first, it starts off a light flashback, maybe that the MC hates apples, but they're there with their sibling, who we know little about but know died young. The MC is annoyed that their sibling loves apples and glares at them. The sibling pretends not to notice and begins to tell a story about how apple trees mourn the people that love them. Some soldiers come and try to take the MC but the sibling throws an apple and the MC gets free. The sibling dies but the MC gets away.

This can go on as long as you like. Apples may take on a significance where they never had one in any of the first instances they are mentioned. After the flashback, the MC may be traveling a familiar road, realizing it is the one where their sibling died. The apple tree is there but it's dead-- well, all except for one oddly ripe apple. Do they eat it and die? Who knows, but you also don't need to confine it to main characters. Maybe one time the apple foreshadows a pivotal scene. Maybe it's a comedic break.

The only important thing to remember is that giving something increasing significance also means you have to close that subplot. If you only have two instances, it usually doesn't create an anticipation plot. Yet if you create a build, you better damn well finish it.

The Clue

I've used this one quite a bit and it can be tricky to pull off without immediately tipping off the reader. After a while, even the most oblivious reader will start to smell it right away. It's important that when you introduce some hint as to a character or object's true nature that you also plant a seed of doubt and even lead a reader's suspicions towards the occasional red herring. You don't want everything to fall so neatly that they immediately anticipate it. Yet there is a sense of reward when they are able to guess something correctly. Not everything has to be a twist.

Sometimes it's what you aren't showing that later becomes the clue. I believe, in The Game of Thrones books, GRRM purposely omits the color of some characters' eyes because it would be a dead giveaway. (The Targaryens, for one, are known for their stunning violet eyes.) Yet the clues you drop are sometimes cryptic and sometimes the characters will even suspect something alongside you. However, it could be narration purposely meant to mislead you.

Certain smells, sounds or even moods can sometimes herald the presence of something familiar, a sort of hidden flag to tell you to look closely, but not be too trusting. I've found more often than not, that observations aren't usually set because the narrator thinks you're too stupid to figure it out. They set them up to weave in some threads that may tangle later.

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I kind of built up from simple to complex but an Easter egg can be light and fluffy or deep and murky, popping up to draw your interest or exploding with a revelation. Fitting them into your story is often something you'll probably feel better than you can ever plan. Like candy-filled eggs, they can suddenly stimulate a lull or force the reader to focus more closely.

Creating layers in your story is largely guided by the little details. More often than not, no matter how much you plan, you'll probably find the meatiest bits by grabbing the best opportunities for change. Don't be so married to any idea that it kills your story. So often, people never finish that novel they keep bringing up because they keep cutting straight through the plots. You don't want to maul your layers to dust with too much exposition or purple prose, but when you fixate too much on reaching the plot points, you'll often overlook those little pockets that keep your ideas worth peeling back.

Try a 20 step story of a classic. Rewrite a simple fable like the tortoise and the hare but make sure at least 20 things happen from start to finish. Don't be married to the idea of a race or that they have to be animals at all. Make it a lazy overconfident assassin and a man racing home through a storm to save his wife. See if you can tie in any of those ideas to create hints or Easter eggs. You don't even need to write a formal story for this exercise. The main idea is just to absorb yourself in a mental chain where changes start to take on organic or exciting turns.

As always, your best teacher is trial and error. You don't have to write a certain word count each day to be prolific. I've had great writing days where I simply fixated on how I would relate a conversation I overheard to make the details most interesting or chained together ideas for my books. You don't need to formally commit words to your drafts to develop skills beneficial to writing.

Some writers do benefit from certain disciplines. NaNoWriMo is one of those events where you can use the momentum to push yourself further into habits. You might have tried something before but gave up easily then. In an atmosphere where people are feeding each other's goals, it may take you further.

As an artist, I absolutely loathed having to learn vector drawing but it was a requirement in college. Outside of that environment, I might never have embraced and even enjoyed it.

Story building, especially of a complex nature, isn't only something you should try once you feel you can succeed. It's often this odd perception of skill levels that keeps a writer from valuable learning opportunities. Yes, effective writing is difficult. But why throw red tape at a challenge as if you're not good enough to try it at any time? Aim high, fuck it up, put it away for later. Those fearless attempts make a difference and someday you might find where they fit.