Description vs Infodump - how do you tell when it's crossed the line?

The only time I've withheld names is either if the character is unknown to the person who POV I'm writing in, or if they aren't important enough to have a name and I'll just refer to them as "the innkeeper" for the few paragraphs they'll be in the story, and also if that random person's name is unknown to the MC...if the MC does know a random individual then I'll give them a random name for the sake of realism, despite how short a time they'll be used. It's all about context. I agree though, it's annoying when everyone knows who someone is, but we aren't informed till later, then it just comes off as awkward...

 

Yes. There are many reasons a character's name can be withheld, and the fact that your POV character doesn't know it (yet) is a good one. And you're right, not to name 'the innkeeper' or any other minor character whose function is connected only with his or her job. In fact, naming every character can become horribly distracting, because we, as readers, want to remember important characters. And every time one gets named, we think we ought to remember it. This 'not naming' trick separates the main characters from the spear-carriers.

It's just that so many new writers start their stories with a 'mysterious' anonymous character, who turns out to be important to the story—sometimes even the main character—and not mysterious at all.

I remember reading one story's beginning where the POV character described a 'tall, dark-haired woman' entering the room, I believe bearing an armful of fabric or something like that. After a few paragraphs we discover the 'tall woman' is actually his mom, bringing him a load of clean laundry. The fact that the POV character described her, rather than named her, made us assume she was a stranger to him, too. It made the start of the story seem threatening, when it was anything but. This is what can happen, when this kind of false 'mystery' gets created. The reader gets sent off down the wrong track, and has to retrace steps to get 'back.'

Starting a story with a false mystery seem to be a fairly common impulse, though. It's one I indulged in myself in my own first draft of my story. When my first beta reader pointed out that if I just spit out the name of 'the rider' that my story would be more efficiently grounded, I felt silly. (My story has changed a lot since, and that chapter is no longer the opener. And the rider is now identified.) Easy mistake to make, when you're just starting out with writing.

 

You made me think about this. I'm facing a similar dilemma of sorts, not quite the same. But it can only get harder when your fantasy has magic.
I've thought of some ways to provide information that have worked for me:

The stranger: A stranger arrives and the stranger puts honest questions that need answering. It works when the stranger has a strong reason to fit in/adapt/learn. For instance, the stranger is in love with someone from this world, but he/she knows nothing or little about it.

The initiation: If you don't have a stranger's perspective, if all your characters already know the rules of the world, an initiation can work. Example: Harry Potter. You don't have to begin with children. Maybe at some point there's a ritual (a coming of age, a marriage, a funeral, something else entirely) that you can have your characters attend. While your characters are in the middle of a love quarrel (example) the priest (example) in the background is reciting the world's lore in the dull routine you'd expect of a ritual. The main interest is the quarrel, but the ritualistic words are presented in between. I'm thinking of a couple in a middle of a muffled argument attending mass. Your imagination can do the rest.

The Ring: from the One Ring. This is where the magical object becomes so interesting it's all about the object. But this one is harder. The object must have mystifying properties that keep the reader hooked since it first displays its powers. Like with Tolkien's Ring, don't tell too much about the object. Display its powers and the readers will want to know more and at some point will be ready for someone to tell its history. This one is tricky as well. You'll be relying entirely on the mystifying abilities of your object. (And let's not forget that the Ring could be presented this way because the Hobbits play the part of the stranger I mentioned above. At first, the Hobbits knew nothing of the Ring's true powers.)

The answers: this one is from The Walking Dead. Early in the show, first season if I'm not mistaken, the goal was to get to the CDC where answers were more likely to be found. When they got there, they had a massive info dump that established the show's mythology. Many lives were lost just getting there. Here, you're making the info dump the very goal in the form of answers. (Again, it also recalls the stranger. They were strangers to this new world and they needed answers to survive.)

Just some thoughts I came up with. Hope they can be useful to you (and me) at some point.

 

To my mind, the difference between info-dumping and scene-building can be found in the reason the author is choosing to write the scene a certain way. You could ask yourself:

Are you writing this because you don't trust your characters to let the reader in on the secret over time? This will likely result in an info-dump.

Or are you writing this because your characters are experiencing and learning something in this moment? This will likely result in descriptive scene-building.

If you write great swathes of description of the city where your characters live, or extensive explanations of the types of magic each of them use, then you aren't trusting the reader to discover these things through the characters' eyes in a natural and organic way.

If you write key bits of information into the characters' organic life experience...

Dota lifted her arm and felt the familiar stabbing pain of her firebolt warming up, ready for action. She squinted, counted to three, and aimed. She yelped as the fireball left her fingertips. It flew towards the target in a wild arc, soaring up and away from the frame, towards the darkening mountain range ahead of her. Dota sighed in frustration and turned to Emery. "I'm never going to get this." Her tutor shrugged. "We all do, eventually. Some need more practice than others. Here, let's do it together." He stood beside her and lifted his hand. Then, with a quick flick of his wrist, released an Indle Ice spell. A tiny but lethal icycle shattered into a thousand pieces in the bullseye.

As the writer, I have set up a lot of information in this passage. Just from this paragraph, suggestions are made to the reader that...

• in this world, there are at least two different types of magic (but very likely many more)
• the magic is held within the individuals' body, but must be practiced and trained into perfection, just like any skill. And just like any skill, the honing of this can be physically taxing and at times painful.
• there are mountains
• there is elemental magic (fire, water, etc)
• there are tutors who provide younger magicians mentoring in their art
• everybody has to work hard at honing their magic, and this can be harder or easier for certain individuals (just like any skill in the real world!)
• the magic being practiced, at least in this scene, is quite likely for combat or hunting, due to the 'shooting' element
• Dota is struggling with her magic and getting frustrated by her lack of finesse (she has obviously been practicing for a while)

Now, if I was worried the reader wasn't going to pick up on all of those aspects of the scene just through subtle description, I would run the risk of moving into info-dump territory. Something like this:

Dota and Emery were at the shooting range in the back paddock of Will's farm, just south of the city centre. The farm was bordered on one side by the majestic Entrepid Mountain Range and on the other side by The Gorge. Nobody came out here except to practice magic. It was too dangerous. But that's why Dota and Emery were there that evening; to help Dota practice her magic. She should have been much better at this by her age, her parents kept reminding her. Feeling tired, Dota lifted her arm to prepare for another attempt to hit the target with her magic fireball. Her shoulder ached. It did this when the fireball was getting ready to fire, but Emery had told her not to worry about that; it would stop hurting when she got better at shooting. The fireball was an important magic tool. This would enable Dota to provide warmth in winter, to burn out wildlife when hunting, and to defend her kin if they were ever in battle. Dota knew it was critical she master this skill. And soon, before another winter rolled around and left her family shivering for weeks and months on end around the bare hearth. Dota squinted at the target, counted to three, and aimed her arm straight out in front of her. The fireball travelled down her arm, burning as it went, and when it left her fingertips she yelped in pain. It flew towards the target in a wild arc, soaring up and away from the frame, heading towards the mountains before it fizzled out and fell to the ground. Dota sighed in frustration and turned to Emery. Emery was her tutor and he was the best magician she had ever talked to. "I'm never going to get this," she said. Emery shrugged and said, "We all do, eventually. Some need more practice than others." Dota didn't think Emery would have ever struggled like she was. Her brother and sister were better than her, and they were younger than her. They didn't need to practice every day like she did. In fact, all the kids in town only practiced once a week at their tutor sessions. Dota's parents paid for extra tutes for her, which Dota thought was humiliating. Emery stood next to Dota and lifted his hand. With a quick flick of his wrist, he released an Indle Ice Spell. His special magic was ice magic. He could shoot icycles almost a hundred metres, with perfect accuracy. Ice magic was special because it never left a trace, melting away and leaving no magic print on its victim. Emery's icycle hit the middle of the target, shattering across the bullseye. Dota got ready to shoot another fireball.

So, it's actually really hard to info-dump when you are trying to!! And there are actually elements in the second paragraph I quite like and wouldn't remove.

But the point remains: descriptive scene-building is best when you trust the reader to gradually put the puzzle pieces together, and info-dumping is when you want to make sure the reader has all the information you think they might need/should have. Some information is necessary, but it can be provided without info-dumping.

Would your character stand and deliver all of this information in a monologue to another character? If not, it's probably an info-dump.

I hope some of this helps. All the best!!

 

One subtle trick that I found on another forum - and thought was amazing for establishing relevance - was contrast: when talking about how one character's power works, start by talking about other characters' powers work, then move on to what makes the POV character's power different.

... I just realized that I used this trick before reading about it from the other poster

Spoiler

My UrFan WIP primarily revolves around a "strangers" plot - my villain protagonists are just learning about the existence of magic and are trying to figure out how to salvage their original plans in light of this new information - but I do have one scene where two of my protagonists are told about a ritual for making healing potions: their friend has been unconscious following a bombing for most of the book, and the mages with the healing ritual promise that they can have her awake within 24 hours.

My narrator marvels at how much he and his friends will be able to do with this incredible power in the future, but then the vampire who has been the bane of my protagonists' existence (largely due to the bomb that left their friend in a coma) scoffs, "24 hours? That's the best you can do?"

 

That's a great pair of examples.

 

I think there's a balance here as well. IT depends on if you really need it to be said or not. Since starting this thread I have learned and discovered that you can reveal things slowly over long periods of time. That being said, if a thing does need explanation, then these are great ways to do it. Currently I'm using the initiation way, and yes I'm using a child, but it's not a "coming of age" thing, it's a bit more unique in that the child meets future mentor, but neither realizes how this relationship will pan out, and it starts out as the kid trying to con him at first. It's complicated, but very interesting I think. So there's different variations of these ideas that can be done as well without being too cliche.