I have recently purchased on Kindle and read two novels which had "twists" I could not stand. In the first, the "twist" revealed at the end was that one of the characters was a paraplegic. In the second, the "twist" revealed that a male character the reader was led to believe was a husband or boyfriend of the character was actually her son. The reason I hate these "twists" is because it would not be possible to pull them off without trickery of the writer. Also, if these novels were made into movies, the twists would not be possible to portray. Don't get me wrong, I love twists when done correctly. But twists based on tricking the reader in this way I don't like at all.
This only works when there were hints in the story that you COULD potentially have pieced together. Like when J.K. Rowling mentioned two of the Horcruxes in passing long before the books in which they became relevant.
I get what you meant and I totally agreed that bad twists are big turn-offs, but these two reasons of yours could have been worded better, in my opinion. 1. Writers trick readers all the time with plot devices. Right now unreliable narrators and third-person limited POV are screaming, "Am I a joke to you?" 2. Having a story that is translatable to movies is not a proper measure for the quality of a novel. They are different beasts. I enjoy reading great cosmic horror stories which by nature would be impossible to portray on screen.
While I agree some twists are dumb. Especially the asspull twists (the one where they pull out of the hat to magically wrap everything up). But withholding information is the hallmark of every twist! You literally cannot have a twist without withholding information! So the 2 examples you gave has no bearing on how the twist was handled. Both of those could have been reasonable within the context of the story. The first examples seems similar to an author I've following (but not read any of her books) where one character is blind and the other cannot walk. So within the context of the story, it's VERY reasonable twist if the POV was from the blind girls perspective. Albeit I don't think it's unknown to the readers because they seem to switch POV at least when I read the wiki. But if she had just kept it in POV of the girl, it could make sense. Hell, isn't that most murder mysteries? A wife doesn't know her husband has a sex dungeon in the basement. Why not? But you'd have to be able to make it plausible depending on the story. Having said that, having a gimmick like the blind girl thing can be a cheap writing technique. So nearly every twist needs to feel logical or at least within the scope of the probable and hinted at earlier parts of the book. Otherwise the problem becomes that it feels like an asspull even if it's not technically is one. Because having a blind POV deprives the sensory, you'd still feel like the clues can come about even if her other senses were the only available resources. That's sort of why I was almost disappointed in knives out. It was an excellent film, but the movie really doesn't give you enough to solve "whodunit?" Before the big reveal.
A twist that relies on revealing information not known to a P.O.V. character makes sense. The type of "twist" I'm complaining about is based on hiding information from the reader that would be known to every character. In my opinion, such a "twist" violates the rules of good storytelling.
Would the first one be able to claim "the ends justified the means", and that it hadn't set out to be a story, per se, but more of a reminder about unconscious bias? I'd agree that this type of twist seems to undermines it from being a story - but lots of very flawed stories make it into print
Well that's a fair point. Though I think sometimes it can work stylistically because sometimes characters can be unreliable POV as well. But yea, I think bad twists without good set up and lack intention makes for annoying read.
I am a huge fan of Vonnegut, and he is a master of the bizarre plot twist. In his case he gives teasers in the narrative that make sense when the twist is revealed. Plot twists work best when they are integral to the overall narrative. The ones the OP seems to have issues with are ones that are only intended to elicit surprize, or shock.
I dunno, there's the unreliable narrator technique which relies on something similar. It can be done well, it can be done badly.
I'm interested in how the author gave the impression the male character was a romantic partner rather than her son.
I love the twists in books. However, if the twist is not very thoughtful, the author may miss the reader's interest in his work.
