Exposition, or "I first came to Chicago..."

[vienna_waits]

Exposition, or “I first came to Chicago...”

Hi, folks. My name’s vienna_waits, and my topic is exposition and how to gracefully work it into a story. After a general discussion of the key elements driving your use of exposition, I’ll outline several strategies and show they can be used effectively with examples from both canon and fic. (Please note I will

Comments

[buzzylittleb]

This is a really awesome post. I've been working on my longfic and I could have done with that when I was writing the case stuff.

[vienna_waits]

Thank you! I'm sorry it wasn't there for you when you started on the BFP (which I'm very much looking forward to reading, by the way)!

[buzzylittleb]

No worries. In places I looked at this and thought "oh, that was what I was doing" It's very interesting to see it systematised (in a good way) like this, it makes it very clear the methods I missed out. I'm currently untangling the ending and how my pov makes it impossible to fully determine Fraser's motivations and have now thrown some modifiers into the mix. Not sure that made sense to anyone except me. I'm glad you're looking forward to it, but I'm currently at the heeby-jebbies stage where I keep wondering what if nobody likes it, what if it's not as smart as I think, what if people just don't get it? *deep breathing*

[vienna_waits]

*gives you a hug, hands you oxygen mask*

Launching any fic into the world is sort of scary, but the long ones you've spent a lot of time and effort on are the worst. I'm sure it'll be fine! (Isn't that Fraser happy thumbs-up icon yours? Or is it sam80853's? Or maybe bertybertle's? Well, pretend I'm showing you that icon right now!)

[buzzylittleb]

I've got no idea whose icon it is. I don't seem very good at recognising any of mine that I don't end up using on a regular basis.

*sucks on oxygen*

I've got an outline for the ending, which is now significantly happier and less dysfunctional. Now I just have to write it.