: Re: How do you tell a character's backstory without explicitly telling it? I want to tell a character's backstory, but I don't want that character to tell it directly to the protagonist, or to

@Shakeerah107

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I love the answers already given. But I find something missing: hints.
There's no rule that says you have to tell or show much of anything about someone's backstory. You have to know it, and you had better know it. But you don't give 4, you give 2+2 and let your audience figure it out.

She stood there, eyes angry as she clutched her right forearm, the scars were somewhat faded but all too evident under her touch.

This makes the reader want to know. Why is she angry, what happened to her arm, what injured her enough to leave scars.
Think of it like breadcrumbs in the forest. Some readers will ignore them and admire the trees, the chirping birds, the rustling leaves. Some will obsess over the breadcrumbs, it will tease their curiosity and make them crave the answers to the little puzzle pieces you give them over the course of your story.

Every time Cassie looked at her, her arm itched. As bad, sometimes worse, than her recovery.

Now we have a name to work with. Cassie. How is she connected to the injury? What is their relationship now, what was it then?
This way, if you lay your crumbs right, with little windows into the past, you can show the backstory of little things that forged your Point of View Character, or whoever this is about, into the person they are now.
A great example of this can be found in how JK Rowling wrote the Harry Potter series. She leaves the breadcrumbs for any who is looking to find them, but she nestles them between so many other things going on that you sometimes only find them after reading the book again and again.

The sole lightbulb in the room flickered. Off and on, on and off. Suddenly, she was no longer in the dank and gloomy attic.
Cassie stood over her, baseball bat in hand, hoisted high over her head with a crazed look in her eyes.
Her chest tightened, tears stung her eyes as she held up her right arm.
Gasping for air, she jerked back from the ghost that lingered. Sweat poured down her pale brow, eyes desperate to find herself alone.

And now you know. The tale of her injury. The tale of the scars in her mind, and not just her arm.

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