This week's episode: Infodump

Time management

I’ve been finding it helpful lately to tell myself, “If I start doing this task now, I’ll be done by (insert time), rather than, “I only need to work on this for ½ hour.” Something in the wording is a really big mental shift. Maybe it’s focus on the completion rather than the time working is what’s doing it for me. I’m using it to make myself show up for exercise mostly, but it also works well if you decide you want to get in half an hour of writing. I think it also gets around the tendency I have to not start something if I know I have to shift gears in an hour to do something else.

Newbie mistakes #3

There are certain tendencies I see often in newbie writing. Info-dump is one of those things. It's common in all writing genres, TV, and film.

Info-dump is a combination of backstory and exposition.

Backstory is all the stuff that’s happened in the timeline of your novel before the actual story begins. It’s the history of your characters and events.

Exposition is telling/explaining rather than allowing the scene to unfold through action.

Sometimes the info-dump is called the, “As you know, Bob,” moment, because it involves two characters talking about something they both already know and would have no logical reason to discuss, but the author hasn’t figured out any other way to feed that information to the reader.

Here’s an example of info-dump I just made up:

 “Sit down, ma’am. Pull yourself together. Do you have any idea who might have set off your burglar alarm?”

“I don’t know. It could have been so many people. It seems like people are always jealous of me. My whole life I’ve been the subject of envy, envy that turns to ridicule, to hatred. My sisters stopped speaking to me except on Christmas, and that’s only because our mother would notice something was wrong if they didn’t. Every relationship I’ve had has always ended up with the guy stalking off in a jealous rage, because he’d decided that I like my job better than I like him. As if—not a single co-worker is even remotely cordial to me. They all think I’m a brownnoser!”

I purposely didn’t make this info-dump horribly, horribly wrong. The voice isn’t so bad. The anecdote about the sisters and Christmas, that’s actually pretty good, because it’s beginning to get specific (and specificity and detail are good! They are what make stories come alive.) But then for the last couple of sentences I broadened out again into generic “relationships” and “co-workers”.

Three Solutions for Info-dump

Make a story intro:

Marilyn was never the epitome of popularity. All of her relationships to date have ended up with the boyfriend stalking away in a jealous rage. Her co-workers talk behind her back and call her a brown-noser. Even her own sisters don’t speak to her, except on Christmas, and only because it keeps their mother happy. So when she found her burglar alarm disabled and the word “bitch” spray painted on her living room wall, she wasn’t exactly surprised.

For this particular story, I don’t care for the “intro” method, but it worked really well in my PsyCop series.

The beginning of Among the Living:

Once upon a time if you told doctors you heard voices, they’d diagnose you as schizophrenic, put you on heavy drugs, and lock you away in a cozy state institution to keep you from hurting yourself or others.

Nowadays they test you first to see if you’re psychic.

Challenge the Info:

Have the listener argue with the character who’s infodumping. It could provide voice and tension to have the infodump constantly interrupted and challenged.
“Sit down, ma’am. Pull yourself together. Do you have any idea who might have set off your burglar alarm?”

“I don’t know. It could have been so many people.”

“It would be more helpful if you could narrow it down to a specific person or persons. Save the taxpayers a little money.”

“It seems like people are always jealous of me. My whole life I’ve been the subject of envy, envy that turns to ridicule, to hatred. My sisters stopped speaking to me except on Christmas, and that’s only because our mother would notice something was wrong if they didn’t.”

“So you’re saying you think one of your sisters did this?”

“What? No, of course not; my sisters live in Phoenix.”

Pitch it!

Omit the info-dump completely! Have the character clam up and act mysterious where the info-dump once was, and then find a few spots where you can dole out the information bit by bit throughout the story. The process of story writing does not need to be linear. You can leave that info-dump where it is in your initial draft, then go back in edits and spread out that background information throughout the story.

Your Assignment

Can you find an info-dump in one of your stories? Think of one or more creative ways you can handle your background information other than the three ways I’ve mentioned here.
Readers and listeners have been talking about the shows and shownotes on my LiveJournal. Join in the conversation.

Download | Duration: 00:16:27