How to Insert FLASHBACKS Into Your Story

what's up my friend Abbi here and welcome back to writers life wednesdays today we are talking about one of my favorite subjects ever backstory more specifically how to insert flashbacks to past events into your story without it seeming jarring with it just seeming absence and engaging to your reader flashbacks are kind of a tricky topic a lot of people will tell you not to use them ever but I violently disagree because when you think about it flashbacks are essential bits of information from your character's backstory which is the root of everything it's the root system it's the proverbial bottom of the iceberg it's everything your characters are people they have desires fears and misbeliefs which all come together to create who they are and how they interact with the world and the plot but they didn't just appear out of thin air with all this internal conflict no it came from somewhere just like you and me your characters are a product of the decisions that they have made in life thus far what's happened to them and how they've responded from birth to this moment in time has shaped them to be the kind of people they are I'd say that's pretty important stuff for the reader to know but although backstory is important it is not the story that is happening right now thus any kind of flashback to anything that isn't the story happening right now is a deviation flashbacks essentially hit the pause button on what's happening right now and transport the reader into a different moment in time which sounds like it would be very jar and sometimes it is when it's not done right but I'm here today to tell you that it can be done right in fact flashbacks can be some of the best moments in your entire story okay before we begin I just want to give myself a little bit of credibility I write flashbacks into pretty much every story I write in fact if I don't write flashbacks into a story something feels off in my debut novel 100 days of sunlight there are a lot of flashbacks I won't spoil anything for those of you who haven't read it but basically I have two protagonists Tessa whose big challenge and emotional journey is happening in real time and Weston whose big challenge and emotional journey happened several years before because I wanted to sort of parallel my character's journeys I decided to do a lot of flashbacks to Weston's backstory specifically the events and decisions that made him who he is today yes flashbacks can be risky because not everyone likes them but I was so so thrilled to see how many people loved the flashbacks in 100 days of sunlight like specifically said in their reviews oh my gosh I usually hate flashbacks but I love the flashbacks I couldn't wait to read the flashbacks the flashbacks for some of the best parts of this book like I must have done something right and that something is actually a very strategic process that I'm going to share with you right now when is anything I do not a very strategic process let's talk about Newton's laws of motion for a second didn't see that coming did you you're like am I on a writing channel yes your honor writing channel don't worry we're all good it's good it's pretty much universal knowledge that if you throw an object into the air it will fall back down again this is called the law of gravity thanks for watching it's been great see you next week we see the law of gravity happening all the time every day so much so that our brains are wired to understand everything within the realm of this thing called cause and effect if I throw an object into the air and instead of falling back down it flies away on its own your brain goes what it would be pretty jarring if you saw something in the real world disobey the laws of cause and effect because we all know that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction action I know your inner quantum physicist is cringing right now so then if our brains are wired to understand everything we see as a result of cause and effect then the only thing that would be jarring to our brain is to see something disobey the law of cause and effect namely lots of flashbacks in books and films a poorly written flashback is a flashback that disobeys the laws of cause and effect simple as that as writers we apply cause and effect pretty well to the main plot of our book one thing leads to another every action is a reaction it's all good most writers think that flashbacks throw a monkey wrench into cause and effect because it's not happening linearly in the timeline of your plot because of that they think that flashbacks just mess everything up and that's where they go wrong yes a flashback will hit the pause button on your real time story but it doesn't have to stop the motion of cause and effect how the real time events are the cause of a character having a flashback which is the effect if every flashback has a trigger that brings us into it and a significance that it has on the story after we come out of it the reader's brain will never be jarred why because it's following this natural flow of cause and effect trigger leads to flashback leads to change on how we see the story it continues to engage our mind because we never stopped learning stuff that matters that's the whole goal making the flashback matter which means there's something that has to trigger the flashback to even happen in the first place there's a specific reason why the reader is being told this information now because it directly correlates to something happening in the present moment and his cause needs to be clear so that we know from the second the flashback begins why we're going into it as the flashback unfolds we need some sense of how it's relating to the story that's been put on hold and when the flashback ends we have to immediately see how this information it provided affects the story how we see the story from this point onward a flashback should give us information that without it we wouldn't really understand fully what's happening right now or just information that enriches what's happening right now and gives it more depth and meaning because of what happened in the past so ask yourself why does your flashback matter what's the trigger and what's the significance what's its cause and what's effect on the story going forward a flashback can also give information that's going to be significant later on but not just that it has to have a trigger a cause otherwise it's like a random floating object defying the laws of gravity and your brain is like what the heck question first answer second not answer first question second makes sense here's another cool thing that you're playing off of here feeding curiosity this is why info dumping and exposition doesn't work and a lot of stories because the reader isn't actually curious to know any of this information we're just being force-fed it but if you can get your reader curious and asking questions then you give them the backstory flashbacks exposition whatever it is now you are feeding their curiosity you are satisfying their hunger for this information so that's the strategy that I always use when I write flashbacks into my story I test them against this process and see if they hold up and if I can actually insert them into the story if it makes sense and a lot of times the flashback is just copy and pasted from the backstory that I've already written before I even started writing the first draft of the book so if you've seen and followed my character creation series you might have written a whole bunch of juicy backstory for your characters I hope you did and you can actually take these exact scenes these exact pivotal moments in time and flash back to them so that you give your reader a better understanding of why everything matters in the current story your characters past has shapes them to be the person they are today just like you and I they have literal neurological connections in their brains telling them what is true and false so you obviously have to figure out your character's backstory especially the pivotal moments in their backstory that changed everything the moment when they accepted something that's a lie as their truth their misbelief and now they base everything their goals their fears their desires off of that misbelief but that is all stuff that you will get in the character videos so I won't go into it here let's recap what we learned about flashbacks today a flashback needs to have a cause to trigger the flashback and an effect it has on how we see the story a flashback should give insight into the character's past and meaning to the way they are today give information we need in order to make sense of the real time story and or give information that we'll need later on but not only this one okay so ask yourself why does your flashback matter what's the trigger and what's the significance what's its cause and what's its effect on the story going forward really wanted to use a story example today but I ran out of time so just go read 100 days of sunlight and you'll see what I mean by inserting flashbacks where they matter and feeding the readers curiosity so that they're not just distracted by these seemingly unrelated past events comment below and tell me what are some good examples of stories that pull off flashbacks really well do you ever struggle with knowing where to insert flashbacks into your story if so I hope this video has helped you please smash that like button if it has and be sure to subscribe to this channel if you haven't already because I post writing videos and publishing videos every single Wednesday except for next Wednesday I'm gonna be on vacation also be sure to check out my patreon because that's where we go beyond videos and take storytelling it to the next level the patreon community is not only the best way to support what I'm doing here on YouTube but also connect personally with me and get better guidance on your story so go to patreon.com/scishow next week my friend rock on [Music]

Channel: Abbie Emmons

Views: 26,672

Rating: 4.9518337 out of 5

Keywords: flashbacks, story, backstory, fiction, nanowrimo, outlining, writing tips, writing advice, memories, abbie emmons, authortube, characters, internal conflict

Id: Ppi-G_X_UXI

Length: 10min 38sec (638 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 18 2019