1. Introduction:
2. The Role of Exposition in World-building
3. The Pitfalls of Excessive Exposition
4. Techniques for Balancing Exposition and Suspense
   1. Showing Vs. Telling:
   2. Character Interactions and Dialogue
   3. Revealing Information Gradually
5. Writing Exercise: The Alien Marketplace
6. Conclusion

Introduction:

The days are long gone of Tolkien-esque exposition dumps of world-building. As far as I can tell, the readers want more, faster, with just as much depth as Tolkien. The balance between exposition and suspense is one that many science fiction and fantasy writers battle. Worl-building is the core of what many science fiction and fantasy readers love about the stories. So, as a writer, you want to give them all that you can without breaking the exposition bank.

World-building with a balance between exposition and suspense can look like a lot of things. A description of a great battle near a lake, a terrifying covert of cybernetically enhanced thugs, or even a spaceship travelling between planets for the first time. All offer you a chance to world-build, develop exposition, and increase the suspense in your stories.

The reason you should worry about balance between the two is because it keeps the reader engaged. A novel that propels your reader through the pages like Superman flying to save Louis Lane is going to exhaust them before they even reach the 25% mark. Yet an exposition (info) dump will drive your readers bonkers if you haven’t given them something to buy into early on.

Balance will keep your story in your reader’s hands and leave them asking for more. Today we’ll cover the role of exposition, common pitfalls, and techniques to balance exposition and suspense all related to world-building.

The Role of Exposition in World-building

From a literary perspective, exposition is the background information related to a story’s main characters or setting. You and your readers most often find exposition in backstory, or a note from the narrator, as you stumble through the opening pages of the book. Exposition will appear throughout the book, but it often turns into the terrifying info-dumps authors are always warned about right at the beginning.

Why?

You’re more likely to insert an exposition dump at the beginning because you want to ensure the reader has all necessary information to enjoy the story. One time, my wife read a short blurb from one of my story ideas and said the way the story reminded her of Brandon Sanderson. She said it was because the story just said this happened and the character accepted it, so the reader had to accept it. Now, I wish I could say that happens more often than not, but it doesn’t. So what can you take from that?

Your readers don’t need the entire history of your world on page one, as long as your characters set the boundaries for what’s possible in your world.

Exposition establishes the rules, history, and other key world details – the very elements that lay the groundwork for suspense to take root. All of this information is important to the readers and your book because it should bring up what they need to know to understand the story, but the suspense then becomes, why is this possible, how is it possible, and what isn’t possible in this new world you’ve dumped your readers into. Establish your character, entice the readers with your world, and then add the suspense.

The Pitfalls of Excessive Exposition

Excessive exposition is a pitfall that many readers and writers are sadly familiar with. It bogs up the imaginative flow and reminds the reader that they’re actually reading a book. Yes, we want our readers to read our books, but the best is when they get lost in them and lose hours without realizing it. Poorly executed exposition can slow down the narrative pace and undermine the suspense you’ve built.

Now there are moments in your book where you’ll want to slow it down. Like I said above, you don’t want a break-neck pace the entire book. Each slow point should satisfy the reader and give them the breather they need. World-building is one of those tools to help your reader and character slow down and process what just happened. Based on the events that occurred, your character will notice different things about the world. If your character just survived a harrowing battle, they may see danger in every shadow, or come out appreciating the beauty of life around them. This will paint the world and guide your reader through the character’s journey, but staying there too long will cause bookmarked books.

Info-dumps and overwhelming readers with world-building is a no-no, but so many writers still do it. Why? Because we’ve found a moment where we can share another part of this world we’ve created for the readers. Half the time, writers don’t realize they’ve info-dumped until a beta reader, editor, or critique partner brings it up. We see all the details as important, and they are, but you need to pace them throughout the story at the most logical points. Sometimes you need to read the bad in order to write the good. Below are some examples of exposition dumps that you may or may not be familiar with.

• The Silmarillion by J. R. R. Tolkien- While this work was key to fleshing out the mythology of Middle-earth, The Silmarillion is a collection of exposition-heavy legends and histories. It reads more like a dry encyclopedia than a novel.
• The early Dune novels by Frank Herbert- While these are amazing books, they contained chunks of terminology and concepts from Herbert’s complex universe dropped in via quote-boxed expositions. This easily disrupted readers and the narrative flow.
• Fans of Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time Series appreciate its complexity but criticize its lengthy metaphysical discussions and repetitive explanations of concepts like channeling.

Exposition is important for world-building, but talented writers integrate it without disrupting the narrative. Too much at once can disengage or overwhelm readers.

Techniques for Balancing Exposition and Suspense

Balancing exposition and suspense is an ongoing struggle for all authors. It may seem hopeless, but there are tools to weave world-building details seamlessly into your story. I’ve talked about most of these tools in previous posts, but you’ll find the focus of world-building here.

Showing Vs. Telling:

The age-old adage. Okay, maybe it’s a little less cliche than that saying, but the point is, we hear about showing vs. telling a lot as writers. Show, don’t tell, is the encouragement that all writers receive in their career. It’s a useful tool to keep you from generalizing too many experiences in your story, but when it comes to world-building and pace, I want you to think of it differently. Show when you need to slow, tell when you’re running through hell.

Show when you need to slow means focusing on the details when the readers need their breaks. You can add in important world-building elements to your story to do more than give your readers backstory. World-building is where you can drop in foreshadowing details about culture that would explain past character actions, or to show the reader the depth of your world. Sometimes the importance of a cultural norm that is key to the story past, present, or future will be the break from the constant action your readers faced over the climax of the scene. Showing tells the reader hold up, this right here is important.

Tell when you’re running through hell drives the story forward and can pick up the pace when readers have relaxed long enough. Traditional show vs. tell theory almost makes it sound like we should always show, but in a fight sequence between the Elf King and the Dark Overlord is more likely to benefit from telling instead of showing. If you try to show too much in a fight, you lose its natural momentum of a blow by blow, though you can tell small world-building details in quick flashes.

Or you can tell if you jumped forward in time to cover the basics of a less critical scene that didn’t make it into the final draft. You see this most often with time jumps where the author basically says: The Elf King spent the entire year honing his swordsmanship to prepare for the battle to save his kingdom. This would appear as a montage in a film. Readers are less inclined to read montages. So, tell them the core of what happened.

No matter if you choose to show or tell, make sure it’s done for a reason. There may be moments in your fight you want to show something, but don’t linger too long on the image or critical point. There may be moments you throw in a quick tell or two to speed up the Elf King’s memory of his first battle with the Dark Overlord. Examples might include comments on how ore for the Dark Overlord’s blade could have only come from one place, or how the Dark Overlord’s attacks were from an unknown fighting style that the master swordsman Elf King couldn’t defeat.

Character Interactions and Dialogue

Character interactions and dialogues are another great tool for world-building with pacing in mind. Instead of allowing your characters that lofty info-dumps that exude their complex knowledge of the world, sprinkle it in with dual purposes. This creates a sense of mystery and encourages your reader to learn more in future pages. Every interaction and bit of dialogue can add to or take away from the suspense in your novel.

How the Elf King and Dark Overlord interact can tell your readers a lot more about the cultures they came from than either of the characters sharing the history could. The Elf King raises his nose when he speaks to the Dark Overlord as he tries to reason with the brute beast. He keeps his sword toward the Dark Overlord and hides his hand of magic that glows faintly on runes. If this were an opening scene, you could interpret this as showing a dual weapon culture for the Elf King where the magic is tied to runes, but the blade is seen as the need for alternate forms of fighting. That may imply that the magic is weaker, or that the Elf society has found a balance between magic and metal weapons.

The Dark Overlord, on the other hand, may walk with a steady foot up and down the crag strewn mountainside, never taking their eyes off the Elf King. This could tell that the Dark Overlord is used to walking along such terrain as they grew up on the side of a mountain before everything happened. Constant movement and not pulling out their weapons could imply the hidden fighting style of the Shadow Durns, who raised him.

Dialogue is another useful tool that can allow for your world-building to shine through. Through conversations between characters, you can provide insight into the culture, history, and societal norms of your fictional world. Dialogue can also reveal character dynamics, conflicts, and relationships, adding depth and authenticity to your narrative. When crafted effectively, dialogue has the power to transport readers into the intricate and immersive tapestry of your created universe.

Revealing Information Gradually

The final piece to balance out your expository world-building is to reveal your information gradually. Think back to where we talked about the infamous info-dumps.

The Elf King may know the exact history of the Dark Overlord’s blade, but it’s unlikely that the readers will want all the information in their climactic battle. The blade may have been made from an ore in a sacred and inaccessible mountain on the southern shores of the coast that was once a land of the Elves. Don’t reveal all of that in one go. You can use rumors, histories, or lore to share this critical information with the reader and the protagonist throughout the first three-fourths of your book. There may be some climactic twist that arises from the blade’s abilities, but information like that is okay.

This approach keeps readers engaged by revealing details slowly instead of overwhelming them with too much information. It also allows for more natural integration of world-building elements into the story’s progression.

Writing Exercise: The Alien Marketplace

Write a short scene (500-750 words) set in an alien marketplace on a distant planet. Your goal is to introduce the reader to this new world while maintaining suspense and avoiding info-dumps.

Instructions:

1. Create a protagonist who is visiting this marketplace for the first time.
2. Describe the marketplace through the protagonist’s eyes, focusing on sensory details and unique aspects that differ from Earth markets.
3. Include at least two interactions with alien vendors or other marketplace visitors. Use dialogue and character interactions to reveal information about the world naturally.
4. Introduce a mysterious object or event that creates suspense and drives the scene forward.
5. Sprinkle in world-building details gradually throughout the scene, avoiding large chunks of exposition.
6. Use a mix of “showing” and “telling” techniques appropriate to the pacing of different moments in the scene.
7. End the scene with a hook that leaves the reader wanting to know more about this world.

Tips:

• Remember to balance exposition with action and dialogue.
• Use the protagonist’s reactions and observations to convey information about the world.
• Create moments of tension or curiosity to maintain suspense.
• Resist the urge to explain everything about the world all at once.

After completing the exercise, review your work and consider:

• Did you successfully introduce the alien world without resorting to info-dumps?
• Does the scene maintain a good balance between exposition and suspense?
• Are there any parts where you could show rather than tell (or vice versa) to improve pacing?
• Have you left enough mystery to intrigue the reader while still providing a satisfying glimpse into this new world?

Conclusion

World-building is an art form that requires finesse, patience, and a keen understanding of your readers’ needs. By mastering the delicate balance between exposition and suspense, you’ll create rich, immersive worlds that captivate your audience without overwhelming them.

Remember, your goal isn’t to dump every detail of your meticulously crafted universe onto the page at once. Instead, think of yourself as a tour guide, gradually revealing the wonders of your world as your characters navigate through it. Use the techniques we’ve discussed – showing vs. telling, character interactions, dialogue, and gradual revelation – to weave your world-building seamlessly into the fabric of your narrative.

With practice and attention to pacing, you’ll find that sweet spot where your readers are both satisfied with the depth of your world and hungry to discover more.

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