karigan
Edited

When do repeated details in a book become a problem?

Lately I’ve been seeing more and more forum posts talking about characters or the narration repeating details throughout the book and how it feels like the author doesn’t trust readers to remember them.

Unless it’s egregious (stated multiple times on a page or every few pages) it’s not something I’ve ever noticed or cared about much since I know readers miss or forget important details. Or maybe even brushed a statement off as something unimportant only for it to be a big deal later.

So out of curiosity, when does this repetition go from being something important to the character that they’re constantly thinking about to “this author thinks I’m incapable of remembering anything” and how likely are you to notice it?

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