Make the reader dig for the "shiny object"

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Every day I work on hiding things while writing, as in, hiding the "shiny objects" (my editor calls them that)—the things that are revealed at the end of each block or each scene (kind of like the stepping stones that make the readers keep turning pages). The surprises. The mini-plot turns. 

If you spell it out, it's boring.

Make the reader dig for them!

Here is how I do it.

Before I put down a single line of writing, I think, "Can I hide it somehow beneath something, and reveal i...