The first half of the book is taking place before the second world war in which most of my young characters will fight and die. I want to avoid the "everything was perfect before and everybody laughed in slow motion" clichés that we see in the movies, but I don't know if I've read anything with something like that in it before. I'm not really sure how to go at it. I thought about involving a few elements of conflict, like the negotiations and things like that, but at the same time, I don't want the reader to focus on the war just yet. (Beside my characters are like 12 at first and they don't care) I don't want the reader to get distracted and view every thing else that happens to the character before the war as just some sort of rite of passage before the big thing happens. The war isn't even the most important element of the story, it's more like, the fact that they have to fight and kill people their age, even though they're basically kids and have no other choice. Maybe it should be subtle, like in the words, put more emphasis on the fact that they are young and careless? But still, I feel like that's ignoring everything else that happens with the war... (Besides how does one even do that. It's obvious that they're young and careless, they're twelve...) Well, thanks lol. I use this forum as a tool to help me figure things out but your help would be really appreciated.
They could sneak into a boxing match (legal or illegal) involving two people (perhaps neighbors, or cousins) that they all know. The match could then end with a knockout, and a later funeral for the loser as he never wakes up and dies a few days later. If the winner was close with the loser you could have him spiral downwards and exhibit symptoms that they would later exhibit after the war. If you wanted a full loop, you could begin with the boxing match, and end with the MCs comparing themselves to the winner of that match. They might be alive, but that doesn't mean that they are living.
If you put your story in the years leading up to WWII, you shouldn't need foreshadowing. Maybe a reference or two to current events the kids would experience at the time, the reader knows the rest.
"But all of this would soon be a distant memory in the midst of a body-ketchup filled, people sleeping and not waking up again riddled, real-gun nerf fight that would last for many years. But it's not a war guys I swear, honestly it's not." Hope this helps!
The Second World War came as a surprise only to Neville Chamberlain, Josh Hartnett and Ben Affleck. The Nazis' rise to power, re-armament, reoccupation of the Rhineland, the Anschluss, not to mention Japan's ghastly shenanigans in the Far East...things were tense for years before the War began and people could see it coming, though they hoped against hope to avoid it. News reports in the papers and on the radio and comments by grown-ups- particularly the kids' fathers and grandfathers, who would remember the Great War only too well (don't forget they were only twenty years apart)- should hint at what's coming without having to bog your kids down too much.
Also going to the movies, you would see newsreels about what was going on. There would be clips of the Japanese invasion of China, the Spanish Civil War, both of which were bloody, violent and a foreshadowing of things to come, things they would see at age 12. There would be the 1936 Olympics, and maybe newsreels of massive Nuremburg rallies, the Hindenburg disaster. Perhaps some new German warships being launched, the annexation of Austria. These are all film clips the kids would see going to see the Wizard of Oz. If they are 12, but will fight in the war, your story will begin sometime after 1935. From 1939 to 1941 the newsclips will start getting as serious as a heart attack, with the invasion of Poland and France, Dunkirk, the Battle of the Atlantic (which scored some hits off our own coast), the Battle of Britain, the invasion of Russia. From that point it stops being a foreshadowing and becomes a wakeup slap to the face; they will be sixteen or seventeen then, seeing their future mapped out by forces beyond their control, and become very interested in their fathers' experience in the Great War. My wife @K McIntyre, is working on her sequel to her current WIP, in which a VA doctor, treating Great War veterans, sees the newsreel of the invasion of Poland and declaration of war while watching the Wizard of Oz (time fits perfectly, BTW). This motivates him to eventually resign and join the Royal Army Medical Corps, to help the soldiers before they become the shattered hulks he sees in the VA hospital.
This helped a lot! Slowly and gradually adding it up, crazy that I hadn't thought about that. Thanks for the tips!
I am reading an interesting biography of John Rochefort, the commander at Pearl Harbor who broke the Japanese code to determine that Midway was their target in 1942. Who took that intelligence cell over in mid-1941, and there was a whole lot of foreshadowing, and also a whole lot of "they'd never be crazy enough to attack the US" Rochfort was an interesting guy, commissioned directly from enlisted ranks in 1918. Lied twice about his age, once to shave three months off so he didn't need permission to enlist, then taking a whole year of to be eligible for an officer program. Then against the all-Aacademy headwind, had a splendid career, was a master of both codebreaking and signals intelligence, as well as serving on several battleships and admirals staffs in the 30s, so a very talented operations guy as well, and fluent in Japanese, having spent three years assigned to do nothing but learn to speak, read and write it. Interesting to watch the behind the scenes foreshadowing 1939-1940
Writing from the perspective of younger characters gives you the opportunity to show scenes that we, as adults, would understand, while children might not. The good ol' unreliable narrator situation. Even without newseels, radios, and papers, tension would be high and people would talk. They might frequently hear their neighbours arguing about political issues that lead to the upcoming conflict. They might also hear gossip from other children who would overhear adults talking about world events. This could create scenes that we would have to decode as readers, and that would create suspense and tension.
Pre-teens are old enough to comprehend many things in the world around them and certainly, they would be hearing talk of a war coming. They may not fully understand the implications of a worldwide war but I believe they instinctively know that it is an evil to be avoided if at all possible. My 10 and 12-year-old nephews are amazingly aware of what's going on in the world today and I'm constantly surprised at how much they do know about things like Iraq, ISIS, terrorism, and other world events. Maybe try to show how aware of current events the kids really are and how they understand what's going on to a greater degree than many give them credit for.
