Editing Tip #3: 3 Steps to Editing Info Dump Passages
Hey Story Crafters,
Last time I explained how journaling before you start writing can help you avoid info dumping your way through a first draft. But say you’ve already info dumped your way through your first draft. How do you edit passages full of info dumping?
1) Identify Passages of Info Dumping.
The telltale signs of info dumping are paragraphs of description or backstory, either of setting or characters. Info dumping can happen in dialogue too, if one character is explaining (or oversharing) too much backstory on setting, on another character, or on other characters. If there is too much description, backstory, or over-explanation over a certain number of pages without any action happening, that’s where you need to focus your editing efforts.
*For Steps 2-3, keep this question in mind: What does your reader need to know to understand this scene?
2) Break Up the Info Dump Passages.
Now that you’ve targeted blocks of text (narrative or dialogue) of info dumping, it’s time to sift through what needs to stay and what can be removed. Keep in mind that it’s best to look at these passages from a reader’s point of view. Think about:
a) What your readers know about the story up until the point of the info dump, and
b) What information they need, to understand the scene they’re about to read.
This will help you decide which details from the info dump aren’t relevant to the scene, so you can remove them. The backstory you provide should enhance your reader’s understanding of the world of your story. If it doesn’t achieve this goal, then it isn’t helping your story move forward. You run the risk of losing your reader’s interest.
Remember, while you need to know every detail about your characters, setting, culture, and other world-building elements, your readers don’t.
3) Thread the Information in Elsewhere.
You don’t need to get rid of the details removed from an info dump. While the removed details may not be relevant for the scene they were originally placed, they may serve a better purpose elsewhere in your story. (If you’re working on a computer, this would be a good opportunity to copy-paste these world-building details into a separate document that you can use for reference.)
It’s also important to keep in mind that backstory isn’t, and shouldn’t, be limited to the beginning of the story. In other words, you shouldn’t try to explain all of your characters’ backstories, or place all the world-building details, right at the beginning. As your characters interact with each other and move within the world of your story, they’ll face situations where this information needs to be provided for the reader’s benefit. For example, the appearance of a magical creature or a powerful object midway through your story might trigger a flashback from your main character’s childhood, which may help her in the narrative present.
These are the three steps I find most helpful when editing info dump passages in my own stories, and for clients. If you have any of your own, feel free to share them in the comments!
Happy editing!
Leah
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Relationship maps are a great way to keep track of who your major characters are, how they relate with each other, and help you plan how they might develop over the course of your story.