When I read a book, I always marvel at the cleverness of plot twists and turns, it is something that turns an everyday story into one that draws you totally into the world of the characters. If you want to know the techniques behind writing clever plot twists, I have devised a few simple techniques for you to achieve it with ease.

Write your story from the viewpoint of a reader.

When you are at the planning stage of your story, try to place yourself into the reader's shoes. Ask yourself how the reader would react to a certain event, and how they would perceive the natural next step to be. Which potential directions come to mind? Write down as many directions that immediately come to you, then discard these. If they are obvious directions to you, then they will be to the reader. Now think of the complete opposite of every twist you have thought of. When one of your ideas takes you by surprise, but it works in accordance with the character of the reader, then you are on the right track. 

Guide your readers subtly. 

Illusionists use this technique all the time to misdirect their audience, but writers use it as well to guide the reader away from a certain plot direction before revealing the surprise twist. Your goal here is to lead your reader down a path and make them think they know what is going to happen next, then sabotage that idea totally. There are endless ways a writer can do this but these are the main ones I use. 

Plant false clues or information to lead readers in a specific direction. Tie up loose ends to totally dispell the outcome the reader thought was coming. Write an explosive scene, maybe an argument or fight scene, then plant subtle clues to the real plot twists in amongst the action. The reader will be so caught up with the action, they will fail to notice the clues you cleverly leave behind. The keyword here is subtle. You don't want to take the plot in a vastly different direction, otherwise, the reader will feel confused and cheated. You want your reader to look back on the story and realize the clues to the real outcome were there all along, they just didn't notice them. To the reader, the plot twists make perfect sense with hindsight. The art of writing plot twists is that you need to find the balance between the twist making perfect sense to the reader and at the same time hiding it successfully from your reader until you are ready to reveal it. 

You can always let your characters guide you to a natural plot twist. One way I achieve this is by freewriting. I take two characters and imagine they are having a conversation. I do not think too much about the plot at this stage, I simply see where the conversation takes me. Usually, something a character says sparks an idea and from there my plot twist appears. 

Although plot twists are meant to hit the reader unexpectantly and shock them with the change in direction of the story, they have to be realistic. Above all, ensure that whatever plot twists you include, they have to be believable, sensible and are authentic to the personality of your character. No matter how effectively you have written your plot twist, if it is too outlandish or doesn't make sense, your reader will lose interest in your characters and your ability as a writer. A reader may even feel cheated and stop reading your book.

To finish, I want to add that a plot twist must not be included just for the sake of adding a dramatic scene. Your plot twist must move the story forward. Try some freewriting between two of your characters today, or maybe take a news story and use your brilliant writer's creativity to see what plot twist you can conjure. Best of luck.