Okay, so I wanted to share something I played around with recently, this idea of a “flash forward” in storytelling. It sounded kinda fancy when I first bumped into it, probably watching some sci-fi movie or reading a book, I can’t exactly recall where.
My first thought was, “Huh, so like seeing the future?” Simple enough, right? But then I started thinking, how do you actually do that without making it confusing or just giving away the ending? It seemed a bit like cheating, you know?
Getting My Hands Dirty
So, I decided to give it a whirl myself. I wasn’t writing anything major, just messing around with a short story idea I had. The character was facing some big decision, feeling pretty lost.
I thought, “Okay, let’s try showing a quick scene, maybe just a paragraph, of them years later, looking back, maybe they seemed content or maybe regretful.” My first attempt felt… well, clumsy. It was like slamming the brakes on the story, jumping ahead, and then jumping right back. Didn’t feel smooth at all.
- I wrote a scene showing the character much older, sitting by a window.
- Tried making it vague, just hinting at the outcome of their current problem.
- Read it aloud. Sounded weird, disconnected.
Figuring It Out (Sort Of)
I realized just dropping a future scene in wasn’t the magic trick. It had to connect somehow, maybe thematically, or maybe triggered by something specific happening in the ‘present’ part of the story. It couldn’t just be “Hey look! The future!”.
So I tried again. This time, I made the flash forward much shorter, more like a fleeting image or feeling the character experienced. Instead of a whole scene, maybe just a glimpse of an object, or a single line of future dialogue that echoed their current thoughts. That felt a bit better, less jarring.
The key thing I learned, really, was that it’s a tool, and like any tool, you need to know when and how to use it. Shoving it in just because it sounds cool usually doesn’t work. It needs a purpose.
- Does it raise interesting questions for the reader?
- Does it reveal character in a unique way?
- Does it create a sense of destiny or irony?
If it doesn’t really add anything special, then maybe it’s better left out. For my little story, I ended up cutting the flash forward entirely in one version, and in another, I kept a tiny, almost dream-like fragment. Still not sure which works best, to be honest.
It was a good exercise, though. Made me think more carefully about story structure and not just throwing in techniques because they seem clever. It’s trickier than it looks to jump around in time without losing the reader. Definitely something I’ll keep experimenting with, but maybe more cautiously next time.
