Chapter 8: Plot Twists that Distort the Motive Triangle

Does the Villain really want the Victim dead?

Classic Plot Twists are plot twists that are staples of the mystery genre. If you’re a mystery fan, you’ve already seen twists like “The Mastermind,” “The Locked Room,” or “The Inside Job” played out in several—perhaps many!—stories. That might make you think they’re stale.

Au contraire! A good working knowledge of Classic Plot Twists can help you construct a plot that is sure to surprise and delight your readers.  And the way you deploy these twists can be totally your own.

Throughout this book, I’ll be laying out the anatomy of over thirty Classic Plot Twists. I’ll discuss how to set up the twist, pinpoint the specific reader belief that is violated, and give you examples of each twist at work. In this chapter, we’re going to deal with three twists that distort the Motive Triangle in some way.

You may remember that the Motive Triangle, from Chapter 6, looks like this: a Villain and a Victim, linked by one of the four primal motives: Love, Money, Power, or Fear.

For the rest of this chapter, we’ll be giving this triangle little tweaks, as we discuss three classic plot twists: Murder on Behalf of Another, The Mastermind, and The Frame’s the Thing.

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Murder on Behalf of Another

One way to twist the plot is to have the Villain commit the murder in order to help a character other than himself. The murder is still prompted by one of our four primal motives; after the crime, some character will gain Love, Money, Power, or relief from Fear. However, the character who gains this thing isn’t actually your Villain. Instead, they’re a character who we call the Beneficiary— and they’re someone who your Villain cares about a lot.

In an episode of Murdoch Mysteries called “Child’s Play,” the skull of a philanthropist named Howard Rookwood is bashed in. From the height of the blow, it’s evident that the Villain was on the short side, and so for a while, suspicion centers on some young boys known to Rookwood. That’s until our Sleuth, Murdoch, learns Rookwood’s terrible secret. Rookwood was abusing his adoptive daughter, Eva, and the case against her looks bleak. She had the opportunity, she’s the right height, and her Fear motive could not possibly be more clear.