A question about showing not telling

[laurel29]

I'm not sure exactly how to ask this but I'll try my best. I am writing a book targeted (mostly at girls) roughly at ages 10-13 possibly slightly older- It is a fantasy and has some fairly complicated ideas in it- I tried to make things clear through dialogue so that the reader only learns as much as the main character but at times I resorted to passages that feel dreadfully close to info dump to me. I was also trying to compress an important back story into a few passages of recollection rather than write it out and slow the story up. My question has to do with how much can I assume that age range can infer from dialogue? My husband said some of my word choices were a bit too old but I tend to think he isn't giving them enough credit. I really do find it difficult to judge however whether I am oversimplifying things to make them easier to understand. My gut instinct tells me to be more subtle but then I begin to worry that it might not be understood. Any advice offered would be much appreciated. Thank you :)

[Silver King]

Laurel, can you provide one or two (very short) passages? Your question is asked in such a broad sense that it's difficult to pinpoint your exact needs. If you mentioned a few specifics, folks would be clambering with ideas to help.

[laurel29]

I'm sorry about that, it is just that I am unhappy with a lot of it so pinpointing a small section was difficult for me. This part is annoying me greatly this morning- I feel like not only was it info dump- One paragraph is coming from a secondary character's POV and the others are all from the main character- I really think I need to rewrite the entire thing from scratch. This isn't the worst bit of info dump but it was the first I came across, later I will post some of the dialogue that is probably too confusing- This is a rough draft so I haven't spent a good deal of time editing this part. If you catch any tense errors please let me know as well, I am constantly mixing up my tenses.

Every night for the last five weeks it was the same horrific dream, made all the worse by the seeming normalcy of the beginning. She remembered that morning in the dream the excited nervous fluttering she had felt in her heart. The prospect of seeing her father and trying to develop some sort of relationship between them had been occupying her mind for some time beforehand. That morning she had been so full of hope. Isabella had promised she would talk to him. She would try to get him to see how much Jenna needed him, how lonely she was.
Isabella had been Jenna’s nanny since she was seven and had grown to love the girl as her own. She could never understand why he was so distant from his only child. Even when Jenna forced a hug he remained stiff in her arms as if the embrace pained him. He rarely spoke with his daughter except perhaps to drill her on an assignment she had been given by one of her many tutors. Mr. Morgan seemed to be determined to be away as much as possible and when he was home he would often glance at her with a sad and unfocused look in his eyes as if he was looking through her at someone else.
One of Jenna’s treasures was a small picture of her mother taken shortly after her parents had wed. She had stood in front of her mirror many a time, comparing her features to the photo and realized she bore a strong resemblance to her deceased mother. The thought had grown in her that perhaps that was why he avoided her. The idea that the tragic loss of her mother might be the root of the chasm between them filled her with a strange sort of romantic sympathy. It helped to cool her anger and confusion at the constant rejection. Perhaps he felt as if he couldn’t love at all anymore she thought. Maybe it had all been bled from him when she died, but Jenna refused to give up. She was determined to love him because he was all she had and whether he realized it or not she was all he had as well.

[Forbidden Snowflake]

I don't think it is bad written or anything. I quite like it.

But, what about commas? They're missing and it's kind of making it difficult for me to read.

But you're head hopping. Which you should avoid, either talk from the girl's POV or from the nanny's POV.

[laurel29]

Thanks, I caught the head hopping and plan on removing that part. I'll reread for missing commas as well. I appreciate you taking the time to comment. I want to post the conversation that I am toiling over but the parts in question are really long and I'm not sure if it would be appropriate to post them. Since I chose to start the story at a more active place and I needed to cover the back story that lead up to it, I tried to inject that into a few paragraphs of reminiscing. I was concerned that this might be confusing to a younger reader but I really do not want to start the story back any further so I just tried to make it as evident as possible that this was for all intents and purposes a flashback. The beginning has 2 seperate incidents in the first chapter-this hopping in time also has me concerned though I tried very hard to make it understandable and read naturally. Key word is the one I keep repeating TRIED, I'm just not sure if I am succeeding lol. I don't know if I can really illustrate what I am trying to say with a small section though- I'm not very good at picking out the right piece to show you. I have to go back and really think about which parts are feeling off to me, and show you the worst examples. Thank you again, I do really appreciate it!

[Kristen King]

I just posted about showing vs. telling in my blog. Here's the link (http://inkthinker.blogspot.com/2006/07/showing-vs-telling.html).

I agree that the writing is fine here, and the head-hopping is a little overwhelming. What about a combo of showing and telling? I like to tell something and then show an example, even a short one, to keep it moving.

Kristen

[LeeFlower]

I think your diction's fine for that age range. When I was a YA reader (lo those many hours ago), I could smell an author talking down to me a mile away. I much preferred having to look up a word (or (gasp!) inferr its meaning from context, which most YA readers are quite competent at) than having to sit there thinking "This author writes like a kindergarten teacher."

Keep giving them credit. They deserve it.

[Kristen King]

When I was a YA reader (lo those many hours ago), I could smell an author talking down to me a mile away. I much preferred having to look up a word (or (gasp!) inferr its meaning from context, which most YA readers are quite competent at) than having to sit there thinking "This author writes like a kindergarten teacher."

Keep giving them credit. They deserve it.

This is so true. When I was in a teaching program and working with special-needs teens, it was like pulling teeth to get them to read the stuff "people" thought they should read. They weren't dumb, and they didn't like reading stuff written by someone who thought kids were dumb. It offends them. Kids are smarter than we realize in a lot of ways. Good for you for realizing it!

Kristen

[Elizabeth Slick]

Yes, me too. I never liked "lesson" stories. They pissed me off.

[Dancre]

I just posted about showing vs. telling in my blog. Here's the link (http://inkthinker.blogspot.com/2006/07/showing-vs-telling.html).

I agree that the writing is fine here, and the head-hopping is a little overwhelming. What about a combo of showing and telling? I like to tell something and then show an example, even a short one, to keep it moving.

Kristen

I like your blog, Kristen. Very informative. Thanks so much for sharing. I"ve got you bookmarked. I'll be back.

kim

[Kristen King]

I like your blog, Kristen. Very informative. Thanks so much for sharing. I"ve got you bookmarked. I'll be back.

kim

Thanks, Kim. I'm working on a new post about showing and telling and should have it up soon.

kk

[Dancre]

I'll be looking for it. Showing is my favy writing subject.

kim

[Kristen King]

Showing vs. Telling in First-Person POV (http://inkthinker.blogspot.com/2006/08/showing-vs-telling-in-first-person-pov_09.html) is now up on my blog.

Kristen

[laurel29]

Dang! I didn't subscribe to this thread so I had no idea anyone had posted :(. Thank you all for responding :). I cut the head hop out, but I haven't reposted that example. I think the worst piece of info dump comes in the dialogue later on between two characters - (the reader learns it as Jenna learns it. It isn't there just to tell the reader because it is vital that Jenna learns it as well - but it still is aggravating) That portion is probably too long to post here. I'm going to take all the head hopping info and use it when I rewrite a scene from Isabella's perspective- I had written the scene previously from Jenna's POV as she eavesdropped which made it hard to adequately describe events because I was limited to making all observations based solely on what she could hear- no physical description etc., - that just doesn't work very well and since I already had written a scene later on from Isabella's POV (a very important one that Jenna is not around for) I don't really see a reason that I can't rewrite that scene as well. The word choice wasn't really an issue in this piece of it, I thought I stuck with pretty simple ones, it was more the telling and not showing thing. I'm stuck on that with the beginning, because I don't want to do a lot of scenes that show all these important things happening at different points in her life. (important in they affect who she is and why things happen but they would aggravate me to write because they are way before the action starts) Maybe I could incorporate a scene with her looking at her moms picture and then looking into the mirror and thinking of her father during her nightmare sequence...hmmm. Would that give enough insight to skip the telling here about her theories? I think I could work that in. Isabellas little POV shift here will go to her scene and the other pieces can go into the nightmare. YES- I love ideas :). When I rewrite them will you guys help me see if I'm improving it at all? Now what to do about the reminiscing to age 5 that occurs a little later- it is absolutely vital but annoying as heck to me.

[laurel29]

Ok now i worked out a couple of shifts that I need to do but I have a few rather large and important events that occured when the MC was five. As of right now I have one scene, that is important to events at the very end, left out completely and another important scene is condensed into a great big dollop of info-dump :(. I'm annoyed by both but what are the alternatives? I can write the scenes out but then I am skipping forward in time from age five to age 12/13 in the next chapter. I wanted to start with the nightmare because I thought it was more interesting, but then I end up doing a lot of reminiscing/flashbacks which I really don't like. If I make it chronological is it ok to skip that huge a period of time?

This is the current first chapter http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=36997 - what I'm thinking of doing (besides editing the crap out of that :) ) is starting before this point, rather than working backwards and then eventually forwards again. That way I am mostly going forwards. I hope I'm making sense :(. Help, pretty please :)