Avoiding Info-Dumps & Backstory

I use footnotes. There aren't many of them but, as you say, they are the sort of things can't be woven into the story. I have a number of people love them and can't wait to come across the next one. I've had two people not like them on the grounds that they are distracting. I, personally, have never liked appendices. I hated them in university because they really do waste time and break the rhythm of reading.

I work info into dialogue, or in the case of the WW1 and WW2 books, into letters between the MCs. I got my wrist slapped by my Beta on the WW2 book because I got a little carried away with the letters. She told me that one of the letters (which was all about the P-51) reminded her of a bunch of men sitting around talking about car engines...I dropped the letter

The Russian WIP hasn't been as tough because the tension/conflict in the story, at the moment, is about how hard life is in Moscow in 1920 and it's social history so it's easy to work into the story.

It's been a steep learning curve but I think I've finally reached a point where I can balance the story and provide the necessary information without it looking like a massive info-dump. It's tough because I always feel, having done all the research, to put in as much as I can. But I've learned that too much information can impede the story, so I've curbed my enthusiasm.

I weave it into the story as best I can. Since I think of the characters as the vehicles into the story and the world, how they react to, expect things should give what's what within historical context. It's how I like to read history in historical fiction, so it's what I endeavor to put into my own work.

That way the focus remains on the tale being told and, hopefully, flowing seamlessly from the period and place in which it is set.

As for extra information, I figure that's what a website is for--sharing those explanations and such for those who are interested in the topic. As a reader, I dislike footnotes and appendices in fiction because such things--to my mind--belong in non-fiction and I don't read historical novels to be educated.

Dialogue, so far. - and one or two line of internal thoughts.

I personally like to be kept in the moment, kept in the action of what is happening, and a few sentences in a book that come across as an info dump or backstory, especially in the first couple of chapters annoy me, and some books I have put down because of obvious backstory and info dumps in the first few pages, and yet, I am a pretty forgiving reader I think, and some times I have read pages of backstory mixed in dialogue and narrative...some times it hasn't bothered me and other times I just flicked through the pages.

Once backstory and info dumps didn't bother me so much, but I have found as I have gotten older, I just want to read the story. I really don't care what happened yesterday. That said, I have a great interest in play and screen writing, and want to see when I read what is happening now, not last month, which I guess makes it difficult if part of the plot hangs on what has previously happened.

This is a tricky question Puma, but I am a lover of plays, and if you watch a play, you can only go off what is happening as you watch it. And the only time you get backstory in a play, is if there is a narrator, or in dialouge.

I personally think dialogue is the way to go if you can do it naturally, and you have an ear for dialogue. That said I am also a lover of objective writing, which many plays are presented from, which I guess doesn't suit the novel form unless done very carefully.

This topic though is one, I have been very, very conscious of in this particalar WIP I am doing, and the aim is too keep it as objective as possible

I could rant and rant on this subject, but I will stop self and say, I don't present backstory or info dumps at all, well, so far in 60,000 words, I only have a couple of sentences in narrative, and another 3 or 4 in dialouge.

I think I tried to start the story, where everything else, to a degree is not important because I did not want to write a paragraph of backstory, nor did I want my charachters having conversations about what happened yesterday, and here I see the difficulty many of us face, in the sense, gosh, how do I write a story and not mention the past? My charachters have a past, but it is not my plot, well it might be, but I guess the backstory needs to be inbedded in the narrative and the dialogue so it it is not noticible.

mmmm - I should have said, I don't like footnotes, and don't read them, unless it is non-fiction. I have no problem with an index though seperated from the fiction text, should I want to explore the text further.

Dialogue and observation/experience of customs, clothes, food, etc. from MC's POV without going on for many paragraphs.

Funny. I was actually watching Watchmen last night (looks beautiful on Blu-ray) and thinking how ham-fistedly it handles backstories. They're intriguing, but they shatter the narrative.

I usually try to keep things short and sweet, or build them into the narrative. In TSOR I had to detail the different classes of legionnaires (hastati, principes and triarii), as they become important later in the story. I originally had the descriptions in the first chapter, but it came off as a heavy info dump. In subsequent revisions I added a section to chapter five where the MC is moving among his men, supervising their drills, and used the scene to introduce the legionnaire classes (and give a feel for what military drill was like back then, to boot!).

Dialogue can work, as long as it doesn't turn into what my friend calls the "As you know, Remus" sort - as in, "As you know, Remus, we were orphaned and raised by wolves..." It can also be very helpful to have a character who is something of an outsider, not automatically privy to all the information your readers need to know.

Just finished Heyer's The Devil's Cub a few days ago. It's a sequel to These Old Shades. Six pages in, we meet Lady Fanny Marling who proceeds, over about three pages, to tell the reader everything they need to know about the back story. She's a woman who loves to gossip and is talking to a man who is willing to listen. It's a huge info dump but it is funny, witty and a darned good read. And I love her closing line:

"Orgies, Hugh. Pray do not ask more."

I'm prone to info dumping (not pages and pages, but paragraphs)and it's hard to control at times. I noticed it occurs when I've come to appreciate certain tidbits and don't want the reader to miss out-so I sledge hammer them with the details. Other times, I noticed info dumps when my brain started multi-tasking while trying to end a chapter, hit the projected word count etc., because other jobs were calling. Another clue was that one character was the culprit over and over. Fortunately, revision takes the sting out of it.

Tricky!

Characters have a life before a novel. Sometimes it is possible to show that back story through the actions and reactions of the character during the novel.

I find dialogue has a limited use in delivering information because it does tend to become an 'As you know, ' info dump if done too often. There are only so many times a stranger can pop up who has to have things explained to hir, and only so many times a character misses out on key information and has to be filled in.

I'm with Donroc. Using a close 3rd or 1st POV allows the MC to observe and make mental comments and so pass on information to the reader which the reader needs and which also throws more light on the MC's character.

As others have said, a close third and a first person POV have helped me out enormously in getting across info I needed to get across. The character naturally thinks of things from the past, so they can be brought up and told to the reader through the medium of the POV character's mind.

In my Roman Britain WIP, there are a few sentences where Calfyn is remembering a fire that happened on the isle of Mona when he is a child. He's half-asleep and suddenly he realizes that the house around him is starting to burn. A great opportunity to slip in a little character-building backstory. At another point, Ceridwen is really pissed with another character and remembers a time when (as a child) she poked a boy (who had been tormenting her cows) with a stick until he cried. She obviously wishes she could do the same thing to the current annoying character.

Dialogue--especially the disgruntled mumble--can be useful. "I can't belive __ would do that, after I did ___ for him." Or "How dare ___ even try to talk to me after ___."

TinneyH said:

Dialogue can work, as long as it doesn't turn into what my friend calls the "As you know, Remus" sort - as in, "As you know, Remus, we were orphaned and raised by wolves..."

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lol, great example.
I read another example a few days ago: "And how is David, your son?" As if the respondent didn't know who his son was!!
But I guess these mistakes slip through more often than we writers would like to admit.

As to the original question, I was brought up short by a beta who reminded me that she reads historical fiction for the historical element as much as the story, and for her it was important to have little details of the era peppered throughout.
So I try to have my characters do things, ancillary to the main action, which can include historical description. For example, in my first novel, the MC is thinking over the confusing events of the day while she takes a bath. That way, her internal monologue was interspersed with description of the palaver that passed for bath-time in 1875.