beginning squels and recapping

[the_faery_queen]

ok, so i've been trying to start my third book for AGES. every time i do, im not happy. my problem seems to be the right point to begin at. i thought i had it again, but now im not sure because i feel as though the situation is set up JUSt to reveal what happened inbetween the second and third book and to recap the reader on events.

what happened is something that has happened to my hero before, so it's not like it's a weird or sudden event that would seem out of place (he has an episode)
the conversation that follows is one that the characters would have naturally, talking about the episode, but my hero also recaps on what has been going on and what everything means (in thoughts)
and that's what i worry about. that his very act of recaping makes it seem like i wrote the situation JUST so i could recap!

if i took the recap out, and this aprt of the book fitted in 200 pages later, it would still seem fine and natural, but because it's at the start, and im recaping, i feel like it's forced

so im wondering, is it a bad thing? my worrying aside, is it a bad thing to have a situation set up to reveal things from the past? is it bad to introduce what happened in this sort of fashion? anyone give me any idea how other writers have started squels, cos i can't think of the top of my head (except for robin hobb's farseer second book, and there she wrote a good few pages of recap, that was a direct and obvious recap)

thoughts on recaps? how best to do them? or should they not be done at all?

 

[Green]

I would be perfectly happy for you not to recap at all. Having said that...

Bakker puts in a short section at the beginning of each new book which basically gives a page or two account of what happened to each major character in the previous book. This acts as an optional read for people who want a refresher, but it is entirely skippable, and for those that have just finished the previous book, it's useful to not have to trudge through recap during the text itself.

As far as I am aware, Steven Erikson puts in no recaps whatsoever. It's possible he does it so subtly that I'm not aware of it, but I don't think so. He has books that start on different continents or with completely new characters, but even when he gets to existing/familiar characters, he's still pretty much starting afresh with no recaps. I think.

I'm not sure off the top of my head how other writers do it, but as long as you do it well, I'm sure most people won't mind a bit of recap. If it's seeming forced, then maybe you should rethink, because bad recap has to be worse than no recap

Personally, I'd rather you didn't put recap in at all. If important stuff has happened since the last book, could it not just be mentioned naturally somewhere? If the recap involves stuff from the second book and I had forgotten everything from it, I would blame my own memory, not your story

 

[Lith]

You could always start off your recap scene with a line like... "it's happened before..." so that the reader knows it's not there simply for a recap. Or is it? The scene has to have another reason to live besides giving the reader information they already know.

I prefer no recap at all, or a short recap prologue, rather than trying to work in a paragraph here and there of recap (as with Harry Potter). Some authors can deliver necessary information so subtley that both the new reader and the continuing reader scarcely notice they're picking up the bones of the old events in the new context. But I've no idea exactly how they do it, so all I can say is try different things until something works.

 

[power to the J]

You don't need it. If somebody is reading book 3, then they've probably read 1 & 2, and if they're really lost and have forgotten what happened then they can just go to wikipedia or something. In today's world, I don't think it's too much of a problem. Also, recaps tend to be badly written and try to sound casual, and when I--as a reader--remember what happened perfectly fine, it kind of gets me mad when I read something badly constructed and cheesy. If I were you, just let the reader figure it out, or put in the page giving a breif explanation like so many other authors do.

 

[lin robinson]

No necessary, and really pretty clunky and contrived.

 

[power to the J]

I don't think I've ever read a sequel where the recapping isn't awkward, no matter who the author--Stephen King, George R.R. Martin.

 

[chrispenycate]

I've read an awful lot of multi-volume works in the wrong order, because this is how I've managed to get hold of them. If the book is well written, you merely meet the characters later in their lives, and learn about previous episodes just as you might for anyone you read (there are exceptions, obviously: I'd hate to read "Cyteen in the wrong order, as it's not really a trilogy, but one book under several covers)

Certainly, in some extended sequel series, the author can spend a quarter or a third of the book explaining what has been happening in earilier volumes, an annoyance to anyone who's recently read them.
Of course I prefer to read in the prepared order, but this doesn't always work out, so a few cues are essential, but if possible giving a different slant on the actions, so established readers will think "Oh, that's how they saw it" rather than "Yes, I already know this, get on with it".

 

[the_faery_queen]

well the book is first person so people know how the hero saw everything
and thanks for the thoughts. i have found, while rereading books (and reading new series) that, indeed, recapping is always pretty bad. either it's a HUGE info dump chunk, or nothing at all so i've forgotten everything and get confused. i liked how tad williams did it in memory sorrow thorn, with a big chunk at the beginning that could be ignored if wished. but i sdon't know if other people would prefer that or something in the book

 

[C Of K]

recapping has its uses. As Crispenycate suggested, you can use a different character for recapping certain events, possibly a character that wasn't even present for the the event. I have found it interesting when some authors give differing perspectives on the same event.

All in all, though, I think you should just write the scene naturally. In life we don't often recap moments in full detail, unless they were very impressionable, and maybe not even then.

Mostly we focus mentally on one or two dominant ideas, feelings or events, and that's it(Perhaps the who, what, where, when, why, and how, but some of them get thrown out as well). Your hero will be shaped by powerful moments, and the affects will be manifest in his every action, negating the need for a one page recap.

Try to keep it down to a paragraph or two at the most. Hit the main ideas tactfully if you must recap anything. It has its uses, but I don't think it should ever be a necessity. If anything, info in a recap should effect your story the same way back story info did for your first volume.

 

[Kissmequick]

I'll admit I'm having a similar problem, but as the first book probably won't see the light of day publishing wise, I decided to make it a stand alone - ie you don't have to have read the first one. So what happens in the first one is alluded to - a sentence here or there, no huge info dump. If the first ever does make it out, then you can see they are two of a series, but don't have to be read as that.

My main protagonist, in the first chapter, discovers that the person who recorded events in the first book has made some rather sweeping changes before he got it down on paper,or as he puts it 'It's bollocks.' So our hero knows as little as any reader who hasn't read the first, because the history he did know is wrong. Therefore any little snippets he( and the reader) finds out as he goes along are effectively back story for the other characters who were in the first book. My other POV chracter did live through the previous events, but as I'm going for thrid person limited, you'll only get anything about it when she thinks/ talks about it - and she doesn't like to even think about what happened.So just clues again.

Obviously it wouldn't work for a straight sequel without a bit of tinkering, but I should think you could recap that way - weaving in little tiny bits that nudge the reader's memory if they've read the first, not being intrusive if they haven't. It's not like you have to recount every little detail - a few clues should get them back into the 'Oh I remember' mode. I like to assume my readers won't be completely daft, and that a few reminders is all that will be required. I'm hoping it'll work for this....

 

[Sassee]

I'm a little late to the thread but this is pretty good feedback. I was also thinking of writing a sequel for one of my novels and would have had this debate with myself eventually. Personally, I've found recaps only bother me if it's the exact same recap from book to book - describing characters the same way, always touching on the same background info that was needed 3 books back but not now, etc. If anyone has it I'd like to see a successful version of a recap.