Short Story: The twist at the end

In a valiant attempt to focus on nano this year, I decided to chronicle my journey creating a humorous short story as a series of blog posts I could schedule over November.

We have already talked about the idea, some character basics, and character Archetypes. Next thing I need to look at is the end.

Why start at the ending? Ideally a short story has a twist at the end. But it needs to be a twist that once the reader knows about it, it makes perfect sense. The proverbial Chekhov’s Gun is planted at the beginning.

What makes a good twist? Merriam Websters has a lot of interesting definitions, but none helped answer that question for me.

As a funny aside, did you know if you look up ‘plot twist’ on Webster’s online it suggests pot roast?

I did some googling, but never really struck gold. The best list was on wikipedia. I decided after reading the references I dug up, to use the top ten method to come up with my twist.

For Max Femur, my soccer loving skeleton who lost his head, what would be a twist on why he lost it?

They stole his head to hang in the office for a best employee of the month
They stole his head to lure him to his birthday party (or undead day?)
It was the only way the team could get him on a blind date with the girl he had a crush on.
His head was going to be a soccer ball in the game
His head was actually hungover from too much drinking and was in his back pack
His head was stolen by an undead hunter
He went to hit the head and left his there instead
He accidentally grabbed the soccer ball instead of his head at the post game celebration.
It was a new technique to be one with the ball (akin throwing wenches in Dodge Ball).
He was getting his skull polished for a date.