We need to be careful how much we bend time and why we are bending time. Remember that every time we shift time, we can lose members of our audience.
Tag: flashbacks
Jul 01 2015
Time as a Literary Device: Unpacking the Parallel Timeline
One reason we might be tempted to use a flashback is to explain or to expound to artificially prop up weak characterization or a weak plot (the training wheel flashback). This is what good editors will cut. Then there is the other way to use time and that is time as a literary device. This is when our …
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Jun 24 2015
Using Backstory Effectively
All righty. So we have been discussing “flashbacks” and I have been working hard to pull this blanket term apart because not everything that shifts back in time is the dreaded “training wheel flashback” that make us editors break out in hives. New writers love to shift back and forth in time because they …
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Jun 17 2015
More than Just a Flashback—Introducing the Easter Egg
So we have spent a couple posts talking about “flashbacks” and I need to take a moment to expound on something. I was a naturally good editor. It’s how I got my start. But I would cut things out or change things because in my gut they didn’t work. And, I was pretty much always correct …
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Jun 15 2015
Understanding the Flashback—Bending Time as a Literary Device
We can mistakenly believe that any time an author shifts time that is the dreaded “flashback” I am referring to and the one I (as an editor) will cut. Not necessarily. We need to broaden our understanding of the “flashback” because lumping every backwards shift in time under one umbrella won’t work.
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International Association of Professional Writers & Editors
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