It is not ideal to overwhelm your readers by dumping all the backstory on them at once. It needs to be given little by little and introduced naturally into the narration. You should put the backstory on hold until the story takes off, gradually deliver it where it resonates with the main story, and reveal it in various ways. Here are four techniques to help with adding a backstory.

Through a First-Person Narrator

An easy way to bridge the gap between the characters and the readers is through a first-person narrator. This narrator can speak directly to the readers and give them his backstory and pedigree as seamlessly as possible. This method is an efficient way to convey facts or drop a subtle hint that would become imperative later. A good example of this is Kelly Morgan trying to escape from his grandfather’s house. Throughout the escape, he speaks directly to the readers:

The plan is to get out of here, and I’m careful not to spill any water on the floor. My grandfather wouldn’t like that. I have a split lip, a black eye, and a locked door to show that it’s not so good when he doesn’t like something.

And just like that, we know that Kelly was locked in his room after getting a split lip and a black eye from his grandfather because Kelly did something that upset the man.

Through a Third-Person Narrator

A third-person narrator can also efficiently deliver a backstory to the readers. A good example is from Elixir:

Chris had been as good as his vow. For six years only one other person at Darby Pharms knew of his research. They had worked on the sly — nights and weekends — isolating, purifying, synthesizing, then testing the flower extract. And Chris got away with it because as senior researcher he had complete autonomy in the lab and could mask requisitions for material and animals.

Here, after Braver had fully begun the story, with third-person narration, he delivers the backstory that explains how the protagonist discovered an antiaging drug. This method should be used a little in your story, as it is less dramatic, though very effective.

Through a Dialogue

A more creative way to add a backstory is through dialogue. Consider this exchange between Kelly and Sam from The Car Thief:

“So how was the school you were sent to?”

 I don’t want to talk about it, but either the lack of food, the excitement of the last few days, or those quiet, nonjudgmental eyes on mine have me spilling my guts. “I don’t remember much about the first weeks. Or months. I’d be sitting in class and suddenly I’d realize where I was and didn’t remember anything from earlier in the day, like getting up or getting dressed or any of that stuff. But I must have. Sometimes I’d look down and see a half-finished test but have no recollection of having written anything. My grades weren’t so good.”

The dialogue continued until we get the full backstory of Kelly, what happened to him after his father’s death, right until his present circumstance. To use this technique, the conversation needs to be natural and seamless, not forced.

Through a Memory

Memory is a very compelling way to deliver a backstory. Here, a particular event or object can trigger a character’s memory that is crucial to the plot and gives readers insight into the character’s history and personality. A good example is Inspector Espinosa’s remembrance of his grandmother in A Window in Copacabana:

He dedicated the following two hours to examining a book that, along with a few hundred others, he’d inherited from his grandmother. Every once in a while, his grandmother had felt the need to purge some of the thousands of books piled in two rooms of her apartment, and these were destined for her grandson, who also inherited her habit of stockpiling books. Their styles were different: Hers were anarchic piles, his orderly stacks against the wall. They shared a disdain for shelving.