Info Dumps in Mystery Novels

My current WIP is more or less a mystery - though it doesn't invovle murder.

In the course of what seemed like a very routine observation job, my protag detective begins to unravel the threads of three intertwining conspiracies. I'm at a point in the story where the PI's equipment and materials have been stolen by agents of a mysterious organization. She steals her stuff back, and in the process gets hold of an agent's laptop.

Now, this laptop has all the information about the organization. It not only explains the history, but it explains how the agent is involved with other characters in the story. It will also clue her in to the fact that many lives are in jeopardy, including her own.

Of course the PI is going to read everything on the laptop, and I want this info to get out to the reader so that the story can move forward, but I'm not sure how best to do this.


The story is told in 3rd, rotating, concentrating mainly on the POV of the PI, who gets to speak in first person to the reader through excerpts in her journal.

Here are the options I'm considering:

1) Detective opens laptop to read. End chapter. Begin new chapter as a big flash-back shown from the secret agent's POV. Walk the reader quickly through the pertinant highlights of his career up to the present. End chapter. Go back to the Detective and continue.

2) Detective quickly sums-up everything she's read in a long journal entry. Story resumes in next chapter.

3) Detective explains the agent's back-story through scenes of dialoge with a few different characters.

4) Some combination of all the above

5) Detective assumes the position of 3rd person narrator with a very glib, casual author-voice and blatantly, shamelessly, dumps info for an entire, very humorously written chapter.

6) something else


Any comments or suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

reph said:

I guess any of them could work if you did it skillfully enough. However...

#1: If you did this, you'd have the problem of connecting what the agent did with what the detective is about to find out. I mean, unless he recorded on the laptop the scenes you walk him through, how will the reader know that she's about to have all this info? You could show him doing data entry every evening after his adventures, complete with quoting everything he types in long indented paragraphs, but gee whiz.

#2: How realistic is it that she'd copy a lot of material from the agent's docs verbatim into her journal? Maybe you could modify this by doing a scene (chapter) where she alternately reads from the laptop, gasps, thinks, wonders, makes notes, does arithmetic or research, as needed ("Okay, so he didn't have enough money to buy a drink Monday night, then he cashed his paycheck at Benny's, wait a minute, that's over on 40th St., that puts him in the neighborhood of the massage parlor, and an hour later he's back at...") and writes her suspicions and so forth in her journal.

#3: I don't like this idea. It would come off as artificial.

#4: See comments on #2.

#5: This would work if done well, but why not combine it with #2?

#6: Does the reader have to know, this early, all the things the detective gets off the laptop? Why not have her start to read, as in option 1, and reveal what she learns in bits and pieces later, as they become relevant to the action?

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Reph, I'm afraid you may be right with #6. I've been shying a way from this because in my jealous, writerly way, I savor every detail of the back-story and would love to let it take over the novel. I actually have this whole story of the agent written out, and I think it reads well, but to plunk it into the novel would add an extra 9,000 words to the already lengthy story.

As for option #5, I tried this as an experiment last night. I didn't want to couch it as a journal entry per-se... I wanted it to feel as though we'd gone one step beyond, directly into the inner workings of her imagination.

The way I wrote it, all bets were off. Because it was the Protag, narrating for her own entertainment, I broke every rule. I took "As you know, Bob" to the sarcastic, surreal extreme. I about split my sides, it was so funny, but I doubt any editor worth her salt would let it stand.

*sigh.

@ Deadly Accurate, Black Winged Fighter, and Mark...

I guess we can agree that option three is verboten. I wasn't so hip on this myself. I realize option 1 can only work if the story is very intriguing, and I think it is intriguing, but the challenge is the length. I can tell this agent's story (and the story of his organization) in a compelling novella, no problem, but in a single chapter... by showing and not telling... that's a tall order.

Just to show you all the precipice I'm standing on, here's a (bit lengthy) excerpt from last nights experimental chapter - the Agent's story as it plays in the brain of the Detective. The rest of the novel up to this point, and after this chapter, is written in a perfectly sane, reasonable style, and this appears smack in the middle of the novel. Is there any editor on earth who could cotton to this?

------------------------------------



Crashing in a cushy motel room at The Drake, on Studivant’s dime, Nide said to his room-mate, “Karl, I am thinking about the things Nelson said at the seminar we just attended. As you know, he wants us… his army of snobs, to locate, catalogue, and study, every artist in the united states…”

Karl tossed a fish out the door and said, “Yes, Joe. But in order to hone our skills and calibrate the Inspi-Database, he wants us to spend several months in the test-field of America’s suburban high-schools.”

“Of course, Karl. But once we are assigned to the big cities, the end-goal is to find the hottest new artists and gather bootlegs of their material so that we may create anonymous profiles.”

“Joe, we just came from the seminar, of course I know that we will present these blind artist-profiles to media publishers world-wide”

“Along with statistical proof of their sale-ability, Karl.” He secreted a banana into his trousers, “We shall sell access to the identities of these potential stars, and the Majors will pay big money to find them and sign them.”

Karl stepped on a cupcake and clapped his hands, “Yes, Joe. We will make a profit, and at the same time, real artists will be getting real exposure.”

“Exactly Karl! We both know this very well, having just come back from the seminar, but I wonder if it’s honest, to spy on artists.”

“All’s well that ends well, Joe. We are not profiting off copyrights illegally, of course. We are merely pointing the way for others to legally enter into lucrative contracts with copyright holders.”

“And making a butt-load of money in the process, Karl.”

“Yes, but we are filling the market demand for quality music and culture, and creating a legacy for the ages with our extensive database.”

“That we are, Karl.” Nide cautiously peed his pants, “That we are.”

#

After the mind-altering substances, which were injected into the Chicken kiev, wore-off, Nide found himself in the Principles office of ShankCountyNorthHigh School, Wistipitakoo, Left Carolina.

Nide said, “We’re conducting a nationwide study, to follow this years artistic hopefuls, into adulthood, and beyond.”

Principle Wart-Face, Darnell Warton smiled and said, “I’ll call Miss Bryngardner right down! She’d love to introduce you to her classes today.”

Next thing he knew, He was hob-knobbing with the art-students, assessing their work, giving short interviews, and taking notes for the database.

Karl snapped photographs and taped sound bytes from each and every high-school artist. They’d been doing it for days, weeks, months! Who knew exactly?

The road was fatiguing. Heady nights, sleepless days! Only the little black Inspi-pills kept them going, those and enough beer to give any man hemorrhoids.

#

Applying his preparation H, Nide shouted through the bathroom door, “Karl!”

Preparing micro-wave burritos, for the ninety seventh night in a row, Karl farted a silent-but-deadly and cried, “Hey what?”

“As you know, Karl, very soon, the calibration of the Inspi-database will be complete, and we shall all be reassigned to the big cities…”

“Yes, Joe. In the service of Nelly.”

Cringing with incomprehension at the sources of his own butt-pain, Nide yelled, “In Nelly’s service, Karl! I wanted you to know, in case we don’t see each other again, it’s been a privilege to work with you.”

“Likewise!”

black winged fighter said:

Just my two cents....
The dialogue between Nide and Karl is very 'as-you-know-Bob-ish' if that makes any sense. Nide and Karl keep repeating things they both already know. If you could work that out, and still keep the original info and story in it, then it would fit better as a whole.

Click to expand...

It's deliberately so. I'm trying to make the chapter play out like a very bad, black and white, B-movie, perhaps directed by Ed Wood. I want it to reek so badly of "As you know, Bob" that the reader just has to laugh.


The Detective has a very satyrical streak to her nature, and this is how the secret agent's story plays out in her cynical mind. The reader is meant to glean the "real" story from this absurd exaggeration, and have fun in the process.

It's like an info-dump with whip-cream, chocolate syrup, and a cherry on top.

Anatole Ghio said:

A couple of options to make the scene play tighter:

1) Up the stakes. What are the stakes for the character? What do they stand to gain or lose by this information? If the answer is, not very much, then find what the true stakes are... and show it. If the character needs the information to stop a bomb from going off, for instance, play the scene up for the dramatic tension. Cut between the info dump and the crises occuring as the character learns the information.

2) Leave the character suspended. If you do the flashback option, leave the MC in a suspended situation before going into the info dump. The reader will have that in the back of their minds while reading and the dry scene will play with more inherent tension.

- Anatole

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Thanks Anatole, that's quite useful! The stakes for the character are definitely there. She learns:

1) This organization has devolved into organized crime and they've got hit men out to get me, and three of my friends thanks to the fact that I posess this laptop.

2) This agent has been stalking my love-interest for nearly five years and can give me the inside poop on the guy before I ever have to decide I might date him (that is, if i defeat the evil organization and it's bounty hunters.)

3) This agent has determined that my love-interest has been engaged in a telepathic romance with a clairvoyant pop-star who just might be the woman who hired me in the first place.

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As for leaving the character suspended... that's a great idea. As it is, she's just back from a gruelling mission, holed up in her apartment, starting her period. She's eating Coco-puffs, and contemplating a bath.

I guess that's not exactly dramatic suspense.

Perhaps I could have her flash back to scenes from the secret agent's journal in two or three successive moments of suspense.


Hmmmm....

reph said:

Fish, cupcake, banana, burrito. Mistook, by any chance, were you hungry when you wrote that?

I found it funny. The bad news is, readers won't laugh for the same reason I did. I recognize it as a parody of "As you know, Bob," and they won't.

Let's take another look at option #6 . . .

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Reph, that reads like the kindest, most wonderful rejection letter of them all. I will proceed upon the course of Option #6, and thank you for "getting" it.

Jamesaritchie said:

Just my two cents worth, but as a reader, I'm not going to laugh at "As you know" dialogue, whetever the reason it's there. These three words alone will make me stop reading right on the spot.

There are few things worse than "As you know" dialogue, even without these words attached. This might be because I'm a writer and an editor, and casual readers might react differently, but I doubt it.

Click to expand...

I take it you're not a big fan of Mad Magazine.

Mike Martyn said:

I'd go with 6. It'd keep the susupense going. Also maybe end the chapter after the lap top is discovered and have the next chapter start on a different subplot. You want the reader to ask "What's on the laptop!!!!" and they'll keep reading.

Click to expand...

You know, that's a great idea! Thanks.

This is the midpoint of the novel, and I've known for some time that the pace really has to crank-up in order to cover everything I want to cover before the end. I knew I'd have to come to a point where I start rotating through other POV's and developing the sub-plots that were introduced in the first half.

I think my option #6 strategy is to return to the detective every other chapter or two, and whatever it is she's doing when we catch-up with her, will suggest a different laptop-fact being dealt with.

One thing I'm very glad I inroduced into the current re-write is the fact that she has lunch with her father every Wednesday come Hell or high-water. I'm planning to use that as a kind of comic-relief.

For instance, a bounty hunter finds her in the restaurant, and when her father offers to pay the man more than whoever hired him, Adrianne will say, "Dad, please. I can handle my own bounty hunters."

[Epic battle ensues - destroying restaurant]

With the mercinary out cold on the floor, she says to her Father, "I'll be in Manhattan next week, so be prepared to fly out on Wednesday. Gotta go, love you, Dad."