My mother always referred to foreshadowing as “The little black box.” In the vein of easter eggs, these hints about future events in the book are best if they are subtle—hidden in a “little black box.” I love these moments in books and movies. It is probably the greatest reason I rewatch movies—getting misty.
In the first chapter of Members of the Cast, we find these lines:
Even when the sweater no longer fit, Margo insisted on keeping it in her cardboard suitcase. In a sudden move, she pulled the case from the single shelf in her closet and held the sweater close. It was the prettiest thing she had ever owned.
While not the lines I would like to quote (spoiler alert), these lines build a platform for a scene much later in the book. I consider that scene to be one of the most telling moments of the book.
This begs the question, “George, did you put that in, knowing of its significance?”
No, but several revisions later, it suddenly became clear what had happened in California when Margo was in the fourth grade. Virginia came to life for me in the years I worked on the book, and revelations like this touched my heart.
In my WIP, The Ship from Wolfskill, I went back and put a little fertilizer on an early phrase to increase the foreshadowing, all the while making sure it remained in its “little black box.”
I suppose I am thinking of this literary device because Abigail Silver’s Child of Awareness, Book 1, has just been published. I am a critique partner on the project and have read the complete trilogy. All I can say is, “You are going to miss some stuff, and it is all there in plain sight!” As Mayor Shinn in The Music Man says, “It’s as clear as a buttonhook in the well water!”
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