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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/32996
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/32996
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

## This is not a bad way of handling exposition.

I have seen what you describe work, and felt compelled to find it amongst the hundreds of books on my shelf. Thanks for the mindworm. I found a book that does this **_exactly:_**"Convergent Series" by Charles Sheffield. The back cover has reviews with high praise by both _The Washington Post_ and _The New York Times_. The paperback version list a total of seven books by Sheffield, this one is described as "Book One Of the Heritage Universe". So he is not a newbie author and not reviewed as a hack.

For Sheffield, the book is about the mystery of Artifacts left behind by some mysterious race(s?) of aliens called "The Builders". Each of these excerpts looks to be less than 500 words (two pages) long, I'd guess 400 plus words.

All are attributed as

> --From the _Lang Universal Artifact Catalog,_ Fourth Edition.

Each is written as a kind of encyclopedic entry; Name, estimated age, Galactic Coordinates, closest star / planet, when discovered, the physical description, exploration history, speculation on purpose, etc.

I will note that Sheffield does not follow **every** chapter with one of these excerpts, only about half of them. He does have a "prologue", and follows it immediately with an important Artifact entry (important to the plot), and has another Artifact entry follow Chapter 1. The next is after Chapter 4, then one after Chapter 6, etc.

I'm out of time, so I didn't review them all or google Sheffield. I likely bought and read this book 25 years ago. But you get the idea. He does not count these excerpts as "Chapters".

I don't think this is a terrible way of giving details, it isn't a book killer and shouldn't get you rejected out of hand. The excerpts are presented in encyclopedic narrative (story) form, with some citations (for example speculations are attributed to scientists or scientific teams e.g. [Ikro & H'miran] or [Parzan & LuLan].)

I would not make this writing 100% descriptions, however. Readers want to see conflict, even if it is not important to the plot, nothing should proceed easily. So your expository stories can be linked to history, battles, discovery, first contact, first conflict, attempts by or on your species for subjugation or slavery or conquering, etc.

Like all writing, it must be interesting, and if you get repetitive reciting a bunch of facts about biology, and try to leave the **consequences** of these features to the reader's imagination, no matter how obvious you believe they are, readers will get bored and skip these entries. If your plot depends on one of these features, then because they skipped your boring list of facts they will become confused by your plot, or whatever happened will look like a deus ex machina:  
_Fortunately, their captors did not know the H'C'Olan could deflate their wrists and hands to escape the steel shackles..."_

Sheffield's approach with "Builder Artifacts" was a standardized list of about six lines, followed by interesting little micro-history scenes (say 80 to 120 words) of discovery & exploration (sometimes lethal), scientific analysis (at times with disagreement) and subsequent protection or commercial exploitation of the Artifact (at times against protests).

Those micro-history scenes made the excerpts fun and worth reading. You need to do the same: Somehow do your excerpt so it is NOT just a recitation of facts (telling) without noting any dramatic consequences (showing). Facts are boring, **_always_** , if they have no discernible consequences (preferably on the main characters or the plot).

Original score: 7