desperate need of people's expertise... (1 Viewer)

[spoilt brat]

hey everyone! How you all doing?

Well, i was working on my MW and kind of hit a road block and i was wondering if anyone could give me some advice, or anything really, kind of desperate for some ideas. If so it would be much appreciated!

Anyways, the problem is, is that i want to add a flashback scene for my MW and i don't know how i can establish that. I've seen in other books they use page breakers or italics, but i can't use either because of the structure of my story. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Much appreaciated!

 

[David_O]

Ideas: appropriate other people's work. Some find it clever.

Flashback:
indent, or use ***, or perhaps don't use anything at all.
Readers aren't dumb.

 

[glitterfairy]

Ondaatje plays around with time a lot - and with no warning whatsoever (he also writes in first-person narration, and switches narrator with no warning or explaination whatsoever (he also never tells you who's speaking).

As mentioned above, readers are reasonably clever - just make the transition obvious (eg the first passage is written in summer, and second one describes snow, seasons can be in lieu of major or minor events) if you're not going to use a breaker of any kind, and you'll be fine.

 

[666_blessings]

The most obvious way would be to have a massive tense shift and indent it or sumfin.

 

[spoilt brat]

thanks guys!!! you've helped so much!