I’ve been thinking about ways to subtly guide readers into certain conclusions since reading those Le Carre novels. The way he did it was so masterful that I just can’t quite figure it out. I’ve done a few exercises to attempt this but so far no real luck. I think the real key is that it takes a whole book to set up readers with certain knowledge that you can then tap to make them know things without telling them directly. That makes it really, really hard to practice. I think I can replicate it on a small scale though by taking advantage of common knowledge though. I do this regularly to ‘show, not tell’ but that’s such a misleading sentence in my opinion that I don’t like to use it as advice. Of course indicating something without a direct statement is the easy part. Planting knowledge in the reader is the part I can’t seem to figure out, but I guess that will just come with time. Hopefully.

I called this post subtle lines because that’s how it feels. Like an artist adding small details to guide the eye, the best writers I’ve read can give the reader a strong impression without a direct statement.

There was a certain feeling on the back of his neck, a slight tingle that raised the hairs and made him turn his head. The street behind him was empty. In front of him a bus stopped on its route, just one darkened silhouette in the cabin. He kept walking, took a random turn, and another, and another. Walking on, head forward, he spied a reflection in a window facing the opposite direction. No one. Strange that the hairs on his neck refused to go down. Could it be just his imagination?

Here I tried to give the impression of being followed. Hopefully it came through. This is similar to a scene I remember from the end of Tinker Tailor. In that scene though, Le Carre is not only able to make it clear that George Smiley is being followed, but also who must be following him. There are a multitude of clues for the reader to latch on to, either consciously or subconsciously. For one, who would want to follow Smiley? Well at the beginning of the book it could be anyone. By the end, there’s only one person it could be. Furthermore, who could possibly follow George Smiley without being spotted. Again, there’s only one answer. Then later in the story when a certain someone winds up dead, it is obvious who did the killing, despite him never being named, or even spotted by anyone. The only reason it’s so obvious is because of the earlier scene where Smiley was being followed by someone. It really is amazing to me how he does this, and I’m probably missing several other lines of logic the reader could use to figure this out.

I think I’ve come to a conclusion here. Adding several subtle lines can add up to one big one in the mind. Even if your reader misses some of them, they’ll probably be able to perceive one of the other lines, or get an implied sense of the whole without peering to deep into the specifics. Now just to craft these series of events in just the right way that everyone understands. Several of them. In just the right order. While maintaining a good pace and the right plot points. Perfectly simple. Really, really, really easy now that I’ve written this down. Please. Please just let it be easy now.

Thank you for reading,

Benjamin Hawley