Twisted!

A lot of writers don't plot out their books. They just go with the flow. Whatever feels right at the moment in the story, go with it. 

There's definitely a plus to that kind of thinking -- you never worry if your book is getting bogged down in the dull part, because you can always just throw in a 'splosion or reveal a character thought dead or, as Raymond Chandler said, "When in doubt have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand." Thus the Rule of Cool maintains -- it doesn't have to make sense, it just has to grab the audience. 

But let's look at this more closely, especially at the Chandler quote. Thanks to the invaluable Quote Investigator, we have context for that line: 

In April 1950 Raymond Chandler published an essay titled “The Simple Art of Murder” in a magazine called the “Saturday Review of Literature”, and he reflected on his background as an author in pulp magazines of the 1920s and 1930s. The tales about police officers, journalists, and detectives sometimes lacked realism Chandler said because they occurred during a compressed time-frame and involved an artificially close-knit group of people.

And the Chandler excerpt that contains the famous quote: 

...the demand was for constant action and if you stopped to think you were lost. When in doubt have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand. This could get to be pretty silly but somehow it didn’t seem to matter. A writer who is afraid to over-reach himself is as useless as a general who is afraid to be wrong.

So it's very tempting to throw in a plot twist just to liven things up, catch the reader unaware. It unquestionably generates interest. Unfortunately, it also can generate a huge plot problem. 

Fans of the original Dallas were stunned with the dead Bobby Ewing turned up at the end of season eight, quite alive... But how? When viewers found out the past season had been all a dream, and how it messed with continuity going forward, well, let's say that for the show's sake it was good that the Internet had not been invented yet. Still, the show, which had been in decline, managed to continue on for a total of fourteen seasons, so maybe the cool plot twist worked, even though it never made any sense. 

Personally, I like stories that make sense. Sure, I read a lot of nonsensical stuff, but that's different -- you don't expect sense from wacky comedy. But from crime stories, I think the reader definitely wants reason. Part of the appeal, even for books that are very dark, is that the reader can understand what and why. Throwing in crazy twists that cause the plot to fall apart ultimately annoys the reader. 

And that's the thing -- the reader trusts the writer with his time and interest, and he expects the plot to be coherent even if dislikes how it plays out. Most people would rather hear a song or a concerto that was written and rehearsed, not an open-ended guitar or sax solo that wanders around for half an hour and just ends when the cocaine wears off. 

I do plot my stuff out in advance, but I often find that things don't work as I planned when I get into the meat of the thing. For example, seeing everything play out, I can find that what looked like a secret to the characters in the outline would look completely obvious to the characters when enacted on the stage. Then it's back to the ol' drawing board. 

And this is one writer working on one project. You see movies that seem to have more screenwriters and script doctors than cast members -- how can they not screw up the plot? All those cooks throwing lasagna noodles and herring and chocolate icing into the project? Too many cooks spoil the plot, no question.