In Stephen King’s The Shining, will Danny and his mother Wendy escape being murdered by father/husband Jack Torrance? Can you figure out which character inMurder on the Oriental Express committed the murder? Was anyone in the first audience at Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho prepared for the final revelation?
Is There a Problem With Suspense?
Yep, there’s a problem with suspense, and it’s implicit in that last sentence: Was anyone in the first audience prepared for what was to come? What about later audiences? Someone is bound to be a spoiler, so word was bound to get around aboutPsycho: “Norman Bates and his mother are the same person!” The climax is still shocking, but once the secret is revealed, some of the impact is lost.
Fortunately, a second path is open to mystery writers. This path doesn’t rely on the Big Secret being concealed. It doesn’t require use of red herrings to throw readers off the scent and send them down blind alleys.
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