When you create your
characters, you often do a lot of work to figure out their
backstory—everything that happened to them before the story began.
The temptation is to tell
the reader all that backstory as soon as you can. Because it’s super
interesting to you, it’s easy to assume that it’s super interesting to
your reader.
The problem is that your
reader wants to get into the main story first, to get emotionally
connected to your characters. Until your reader cares about the main
story, he or she doesn’t care about your backstory. Backstory is
incredibly important, but it’s like salt in the soup. A little goes a
long way.
So how do you handle that? How much backstory should you tell? When should you tell it? What do you do with the backstory you never tell your reader?
To squeeze it all down to one critical question: How do you know how much backstory to write into the scene you’re working on right now?
My Rule of Thumb for Backstory
My working rule of thumb
is to introduce backstory “just in time.” Meaning that when you’re
writing a scene where the backstory plays a crucial role, you tell the
reader whatever bit of backstory you need right when you need it. Just
that and no more.
This is a rule of thumb,
not an ironclad rule. Of course you’ll sometimes need to introduce
backstory before you need it. But if you don’t need to, then don’t.
The reason for telling
backstory just in time is that backstory tends to slow down your story.
It’s a good idea to not slow it down any more than you have to.
An Example of Just in Time Backstory
A month or two ago, I read the novel The President is Missing,
by James Patterson and Bill Clinton. I thought it would give me an
inside look into the job of being President, and I was right. My working
assumption here is that Patterson did all or most of the writing and
Clinton provided the background info, which seems the most likely way
they split out the duties of coauthoring situation. So in my analysis
below, I’ll refer to Patterson as the writer, even though of course
Clinton is a coauthor.
The protagonist of the
book is President Jonathan Duncan. Cyberterrorists have targeted the US
with a lethal computer virus that could bring the country to its knees.
The President and eight of his closest advisors know the virus exists,
and they’re desperate to prevent a catastrophe. The President also knows
that one of the eight is a traitor, which makes his job even harder.
He’s got to save the country and unmask the traitor, and he has two
days. Congressional leaders aren’t in on the secret, so all they know is
that the President is acting very weird and could possibly be
committing treason.
I read the book a couple
of times. The first to enjoy the story. The second to take it apart and
see how it works. James Patterson is a wily author who uses every trick
in the book to weave unexpected twists into his stories. I wanted to
study his set of tricks.
On my second read through
the book, I took note of Patterson’s careful handling of backstory. Very
often, he brought it into a scene exactly when he needed it.
A nice example is the opening chapter, which begins with this bit of dialogue: “The House Select Committee will come to order …”
This is a very tricky scene
to get right. The author has to introduce the protagonist, President
Duncan, make it clear that he is genuinely the good guy in this story,
and introduce the predatory congress-critters who are out to get the
President. All from a cold start in which the reader knows nothing about
the President, his congressional opposition, or the cyberthreat facing
the country.
This scene could very
easily be a boring encyclopedia article on how a congressional
investigation goes. But it isn’t. It’s a reasonably fast-paced scene
that puts our hero in danger immediately, without confusing the reader.
How does Patterson make this scene work?
He does it by mixing in action, dialogue, and carefully measured-out bits of backstory.
The first paragraph is the snip of dialogue I already quoted above.
Then comes a paragraph of
interior monologue about the sharks on the House Select Committee and
the President’s fears in dealing with them.
Then three quick paragraphs
of backstory, direct quotes from the previous night, when the
President’s chief of staff urged him not to testify. This counts as
backstory, but it’s told as dialogue—essentially a mini-flashback.
Then there’s a paragraph
showing us what the President sees, thirteen angry congressmen. The
paragraph zooms in on the nameplate of the chairman, Lester Rhodes.
Then there’s a paragraph
of backstory about Rhodes, explaining why he’s so dangerous to the
President. This is told as interior monologue, so it’s in the
President’s voice, and it’s told in a way that makes you empathize with
the President. You don’t have to be told the President is the good guy
of this story, because you feel it.
Then there’s another
paragraph of action. The President adjusts his mike so he won’t have to
lean forward. He’s paying attention to his body language, doing
everything he can to avoid looking weak. This is the sort of thing that
real presidents have to think about.
Next is a paragraph of interior monologue. The President is prepping to be grilled.
The scene continues like
that for the rest of the chapter. There’s a bit of
action/dialogue/interior monologue. Then there’s a bit of backstory to
explain what the heck is happening.
This could easily go wrong, and there are two ways to fail:
- Show too much action and dialogue, without enough backstory to understand what’s happening. This fails by confusing the reader.
- Tell too much backstory, without enough action and dialogue to keep the story moving. This fails by boring the reader.
There’s a fine line you
have to walk in this kind of scene. I’ve read the scene several times,
and my judgment is that Patterson nailed it. The scene is quite long,
but it’s compelling and reasonably clear at all points. And it ends with
a cliffhanger that forces you to turn the page.
In such a complex first scene, I don’t see any way to do it better.
Breaking the Rule of Thumb
For most of the story,
Patterson follows our rule of thumb very closely. He introduces
backstory just in time. But there are certain points at which he
doesn’t. There are a few places where he gives you a bit of backstory
for no obvious reason.
But there is a reason. If
you read the book, be watching for those apparently unnecessary bits of
backstory. Some of them are clues that will turn into major surprises a
hundred pages down the road. Or two hundred pages.
Not all of them are clues.
But some of them are. A good author seeds in clues far in advance of
the surprise. Then the reader doesn’t feel cheated when he realizes he’s
been misled. Because the clues were there.
A big part of the art of
writing major plot twists is seeding in clues to plot twists a long time
in advance, often using what appears to be innocent backstory.
I’m not in the business of
spoiling other authors’ plot twists, so I won’t give examples of just
how Patterson worked his magic with his plot twists. But study how
Patterson hides his clues in the backstory, doing his best to make you
slap your head when you reach the twist and say, “Dang! I should have
seen that coming!”
And if you’re observant, you will see it coming and you can bask in the glow of your own cleverness—until you hit the next twist that you didn’t foresee.
Enjoy the Ride
You may or may not buy
into the idea that a supervirus can infect machines running a wide
variety of operating systems—Mac OS, Windows, Linux, and numerous other
flavors of Unix. But whether you do or not, you can enjoy the story and
learn from the master. This is a political thriller, not a
technothriller.
Have fun!
About The Author
Randy Ingermanson
is a theoretical physicist and the award-winning author of six novels.
He has taught at numerous writing conferences over the years and
publishes the free monthly Advanced Fiction Writing E-zine.
