Has anyone here ever been put off by a header "5 years later," come on anyone?
I don't think so. At least, I haven't. But when I'm trying to pass time forward five years in my story I feel like I'm breaking a cardinal rule by literally writing "5 years later."
Posted by Antinomy (Member # 5136) on :
Transitions are like beginnings and endings. Sometimes we want to write specific transitional lines and paragraphs when our stories should naturally provide most or all of the transitions that are necessary. They should be as simple, direct and concise as possible.
Instead of, “Five years later….”
On her 20th birthday…… After serving a tour in the Iraq War….. The day after he graduated High School….. Her wedding gown was made of silk brocade….
Posted by RMatthewWare (Member # 4831) on :
I don't have a problem with it. It's like in those movies when they do it, it just lets you know time has passed. You can do it other ways, like put in the text "Five years had passed since..."
Either way works for me.
Posted by Zero (Member # 3619) on :
My instinct is to do like Antimony says, which works until what happened in the previous writing is disjointed from the POV, setting and characters of the second. I want to establish that time has passed, but everything possible has changed.
It'd be like:
...and so Eric and Jim fought to the death over that twinkie.
***
It had been five years since the twinkie battle, but Bill knew nothing about it, because he grew up in London far from Wyoming....
And that sucks.
[This message has been edited by Zero (edited July 02, 2007).]
Posted by InarticulateBabbler (Member # 4849) on :
Like OSC says, there's a cost for everything. If you do it, make sure you know the cost, and what its worth. Some readers are apt to be put off by it; others will like the breaking point, just hope they pick it back up.
Posted by dee_boncci (Member # 2733) on :
No, never been upset by something like that. Actually, if you have to skip that much time, I think it's best to indicate it in some way.
Posted by ArachneWeave (Member # 5469) on :
Because you don't have a dissenting voice, I will pipe up here:
Yes.
I don't really like abrupt shifts in time. The more smooth the transition the less I feel jerked forward. It does depend a lot on your handling. If it makes what's gone before a prologue, I might get exasperated. If it needed to be quick to keep the action coming, that's fine, as long as you don't jerk me out of the story I think I'm reading.
And I'm just one person. I often sacrifice clarity to subtlety, too, and then have to go back and write in everything I tried to leave unsaid, because it's not as apparent as I thought. Remember, if you don't like it, it may be that the story would be better with it differently. That's something you can always go back and rework, though.
Posted by J (Member # 2197) on :
Although there are numerous exceptions, I generally feel like an author who says "five years later" is getting lazy at my expense. That phrase is direct authorial commentary. If you have an intrusive writing voice in 3rd person omniscient (like, say C.S. Lewis most of the time), it's no problem. If you are writing from 3rd limited, 5 years later is likely to be a POV violation.
In any case, there are so many ways to mark the passage of time, I'm of the school that says that intruding on the story to bring it to the reader's attention should be done for an articulable reason (not being able to think of another way to do it doesn't count).
In the twinkie example, you don't have to mark the 5 years immediately. Just start talking about Bill's story (presumably from his POV), be patient, and mark the time when an opportunity arises.
"Did I ever tell you about the time Jim and I fought over a twinkie?" Eric said. "Who won?" Bill said. "Don't remember. It hardly matters now. The twinkie is so stale I can use it as a hammer." "Twinkies get stale?" Bill raised his eyebrows. "After five years they do."
[This message has been edited by J (edited July 02, 2007).]
Posted by KayTi (Member # 5137) on :
You can do a lot with a little compressed narrative. Yes, I would be put off by "fast forward five years" mainly because it's just a cliche to say it that way. Passing 5 years of time in the middle of a book? I can tolerate that (though that makes me wonder whether it's two separate stories - two books? Part 1, Part 2, etc.? Particularly if there is a POV shift that happens also...)
I agree w/previous poster about it making me annoyed if the effect of that line was to make everything else seem like prologue. That would be aggravating.
So - the trick is to write it well. As I started this post with - you can do a lot with a little compressed narrative...some brainstorms:
In the five years since that fateful twinkie battle, loves were won and lost, jobs held, babies born, and a few cattle too. Eric could hardly believe how much little Bessie had grown...
As every year previous, Eric marked the anniversary of the Great Twinkie Battle by taking a twinkie out to the firing range and shooting it. In this year, the fifth anniversary, he decided to do something special - he made a twinkie pyramid which he then carefully dismantled top-down with his expert shooting.
Alternatively, some authors get past this sort of thing by putting a date stamp at the top of each chapter. So what if sometimes 5 years have elapsed?
Another thing to consider is if you're telling your story in the right order. You'll probably find a large group of people who really hate flashbacks, so it's not that a flashback is the right solution, but it's just something else worth considering when asking yourself these kinds of big questions about your story.
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
I'm inclined to go along with "five years later"---provided the characters act like they didn't sit around and do nothing while waiting for the action to resume. And if they did do something interesting, why not write about that?
Posted by darklight (Member # 5213) on :
Maybe I'm reading the wrong book, but I can't remember seeing Five years later. I guess if it's a one off, its ok. I've read (and written) many that take place over many years and if handled right, it doesn't jar or put me off at all. I have read some that give date headers at the beginning of a scene, chapter or whenever its needed and I don't have a problem with that at all. If its clear and not out of character with the novel, its fine with me.
Posted by Zero (Member # 3619) on :
Thanks for the advice. I have it now I have omitted the "five years later" tag and in a previous passage alluded to a five year jump in time, but otherwise the change is implicit. I'm sure the reader will figure it out just fine. Thanks again.
Posted by Balthasar (Member # 5399) on :
No, has never made me stop reading that I can think of. What doesn't work for me is subtly when it comes to time shifts, hinting at it so that only readers paying super-close attention to the details get it. Faulkner I do not like.
So my advice is simple: If you do it, make sure you let the reader know you're doing it as quickly and simply as possible.
"Five years later..." is perfect, I think.
Posted by Lynda (Member # 3574) on :
I actually prefer the clarity of "five years later" when there's a time shift like that. If you weave it into the story, it might be too subtle and make the reader stop and scratch his/her head and say "Huh??" I prefer to see a novel that has something like "Five years later" at the beginning of the newer passage, with an explanation of what happened between that and the older passage brought out in the newer chapter. If I have to stop and wonder how much time passed, I've been thrown out of the story, and that's just annoying.