Foreshadowing

If ever there were an amazing example of foreshadowing, Hugo would have to be number one. There are probably even instances that I didn't even notice, because I wasn't watching it fully.                      

Foreshadow| verb: to give a suggestion of (something that has not yet happened)

                : to represent, indicate or typify beforehand: prefigure 

I'll give you a couple of examples from this movie and then maybe you can see what types of foreshadowing you can put in your story.

So, here's the basic premise of Hugo. Hugo lives in a clock in a train station in London. His father has died and his drunk uncle has abandoned him after teaching him how to wind the clocks. His life's goal is to find out why his father died and he plans on doing that by fixing the automaton that his father never finished before he died. It's a writing automaton and he's convinced that the note it writes will be a message from his father.

The movie

The real life situation

Foreshadowing example #1: Hugo's father always used to take him to the movies and so, when he meets a girl who has never seen the movies, he sneaks her into a movie theater and shows her what a movie looks like. In the movie, a man is trying to climb a wall and loses his balance and grabs the nearest thing, the minute hand of a nearby clock and he dangles. Later in the movie, when Hugo is attempting to get away from someone, he inches out the window in a clock and grabs hold of the minute hand and he dangles, waiting for the danger to pass.

Foreshadowing example #2: Hugo is having a dream. He's walking next to the train tracks and on the slats he sees a key. And not just any key. It just so happens to be the key that operates the automaton that he's finally fixed. He jumps onto the tracks and is turning the key over and over and wondering what it's doing on the tracks and the tracks start shaking and the train is barreling toward him. Later, in real life, the automaton falls onto the tracks and the train is pulling in and Hugo jumps onto the tracks to retrieve it, the tracks shaking and the train barreling toward him.

Foreshadowing can enrich your novel and add depth. It's also a pleasant surprise to re-read a book and look at those little tidbits and realize, "Oh, that's what they meant."