A WRITING PROMPT FROM ME TO YOU: Foreshadowing.
MA
Sunday Snapshot: A Taste Of Autumn
A WRITING PROMPT FROM ME TO YOU: Foreshadowing.
MA
Alicia Butcher Ehrhardt
August 23, 2020 at 1:40pmForeshadowing is my thing. Almost everything I write that you don’t get instantly, because it doesn’t relate directly to the current scene, is either connected to the past – or is tied to the future.
It is the web of reasons why fiction works for me better than real life: what goes in is relevant – to the whole.
It drives me nuts sometimes to create it, because it must only be hinted at, and not be obvious until the very end (which could be the end of a thread, or a character, too). I think that’s why we read: to show how it COULD be.
It’s the fun part, but fun that you need to do work for. And I have to ask myself continuously: is this too much?
Foreshadowing is a deliberate act, a part of the structure.
Which just gave me some ideas for a knot I’m trying to untangle, before I get the sword out.
Marian Allen
August 23, 2020 at 5:11pmYay! I do love subtle foreshadowing, especially when it’s something that doesn’t seem particularly relevant but sticks in the mind, and then the reason for it arrives and it pops like fireworks. You do that SO well! Even better, as a mixed plot/pants writer, is the detail that did two jobs and then, farther along, it turns out to have been doing three or more jobs and I didn’t consciously realize it.
Alicia Butcher Ehrhardt
August 23, 2020 at 5:22pmWe aim to please. It takes time, not only in the writing, but in the deciding in the first place, and then in the plotting.
I just like the effect, and I am my first reader.
I confess to having re-read everything in Book 2 twice recently, and the really good part four times (a six scene arc that give the plot a kick in the seat of the pants).
Dan Antion
August 23, 2020 at 7:33amIt seems to be coming early for the trees, but the long hot summer persists. I’m ready for autumn.
Marian Allen
August 23, 2020 at 5:08pmThe weather has been beautiful here. Open windows at night and in the low 80s in the day. No doubt we have our dog days just ahead.