Transition - MC unconscious then back in action

[msstice]

I have a chapter where disaster befalls the MC and they are knocked unconscious. The next chapter is a switch in POV, showing the MCs rescue. It ends with the MC still unconscious but safe. The next chapter has the MC back in action 100%.

I feel that I need a transition. I wrote a "recovery and reconciliation" chapter but I felt it bogged down the pace. I have the following ideas I'd like to bounce off:

1. Make allusions to the recovery while showing MC at 100%.
2. Have a really short "recovery and reconciliation" chapter that slows the pace, but only for a little bit.
3. Have a longer transition chapter and make the chapter interesting by adding backstory.

 

[The Judge]

How much time passes during the recovery? Does anything of interest arise in this time?

If it's a short while and nothing happens except he gets better I'd probably go with your first option and just have at most a paragraph or two within the chapter when he's back to normal. If you want a kind of transition, then have something at the beginning of that chapter and then seque into whatever he's doing now ie "It took three long weeks for Fred to recover, and as he walked down the corridor to meet Admiral Jones to discuss his promotion, he was still limping a little." (Only better than that, obviously.)

 

[tinkerdan]

My first novel has this.
It is first person POV; however, I set the reader up in advance by including chapter of other characters in third close. That way when my character is unconscious the character nearest her can take over and the action doesn't have to stop. It follows straight through until the first person POV regains consciousness.

Whatever you decide, it should be relevant and something that keeps the story moving forward.

The last thing you want to do is make the reader feel like you just went to commercial break and it's time for them to go raid the fridge.

 

[sule]

I agree with the above posts that it should be fine to briefly mention the length of the recuperation while getting on with the next scene.

However, I think you can still do a full scene if you still feel that it is necessary. It's possible the reason the full recuperation scene didn't work for you the first time was because showing the recuperation of the MC was the only thing it was accomplishing. If you find that you really need that scene I would suggest incorporating some other thing (like a character arc or subplot) to advance alongside the passage of time while the MC recuperates, and that may give the scene the extra oomph it needs to be more than just an interstitial placeholder.

 

[Juliana]

I would suggest incorporating some other thing (like a character arc or subplot) to advance alongside the passage of time while the MC recuperates, and that may give the scene the extra oomph it needs to be more than just an interstitial placeholder.

I agree with this. In my first attempts at novel writing I thought everything had to happen at break-neck speed and slow spots were Bad. But over time I've really come to appreciate these slower bits where the character gets to breathe a bit. Those are often where we get to see a character's personal development and find out things about their backstory, or their fears and dreams.

And a character in recovery can still be active. If there's an investigation, for instance, they can uncover important information or meet with informants...

 

[Wayne Mack]

For a period of unconsciousness, I would probably just have a nurse or attendant tell the main character what happened. Barring an extended duration coma, I am not sure the time lapse justifies jumping to another POV. One option might be to allow the main character to have fevered dreams or momentary wakeful periods to allow first person description of the situation. This might have an added benefit in that the main character may not know whether events were real or imagined. I am not sure a POV switch for 5 - 60 minutes of unconsciousness is justified. For a longer duration of days to weeks, it might be called for, but I would still lean towards the fevered dreams approach.

 

[Mad Alice]

Incapacitated doesn't necessarily mean unconscious. An induced concussion (which is what you are talking about when you have rendered someone unconscious), a choking to unconsciousness and a faint all, recover partial sentience fairly quickly, sometimes within minutes. Drugs used to incapacitate will cause dizziness and euphoria and disassociate episodes of the environment and senses going wonky before an actual blackout episode. Even then you can hear everything for a lot longer even if your eyes refuse to open or focus or move.
Even sedation from anesthetic isn't perfect in this aspect.
Therefore if you need to convey intermediate action between scenes of consciousness, you could suggest what is happening around the supposedly unconscious person. What he hears, feels, smells, are all fair game. Flashes of light and unfocused or partially obscured objects. Anything like that.

 

[msstice]

@Wayne Mack I struggled over the change in POV too.

I got great inputs from you and others on the POV shift (Main POV becomes unconscious.). I tried writing it so that the MC sees the events via a recording as they recover but I felt uneasy doing it. Basically, since the MC is now saved, the playback wasn't so dramatic anymore, and the rescuer's struggle did not seem so immediate. Writing it from the POV of this new character, as the rescuer tries to save the MC, felt better. So it's a judgement call, and I'll have to see how things work out over the rest of the book.

However, now I have no excuse for lingering on the MC while they recover

 

[msstice]

How much time passes during the recovery? Does anything of interest arise in this time?

If it's a short while and nothing happens except he gets better I'd probably go with your first option and just have at most a paragraph or two within the chapter when he's back to normal. If you want a kind of transition, then have something at the beginning of that chapter and then seque into whatever he's doing now ie "It took three long weeks for Fred to recover, and as he walked down the corridor to meet Admiral Jones to discuss his promotion, he was still limping a little." (Only better than that, obviously.)

I like this! I think the way I've written it now, with a POV shift during the MC being rescued, will flow well with some subtle acknowledgement of the rescue and recovery. Right now it flows well, except I'm sitting there as a reader going wait, are some pages missing? How is the MC up and about and pretending nothing happened?

Whether my choice to do a POV shift is wise overall is a different burger of worms.

 

[DLCroix]

I have a chapter where disaster befalls the MC and they are knocked unconscious. The next chapter is a switch in POV, showing the MCs rescue. It ends with the MC still unconscious but safe. The next chapter has the MC back in action 100%.

I feel that I need a transition. I wrote a "recovery and reconciliation" chapter but I felt it bogged down the pace. I have the following ideas I'd like to bounce off:

1. Make allusions to the recovery while showing MC at 100%.
2. Have a really short "recovery and reconciliation" chapter that slows the pace, but only for a little bit.
3. Have a longer transition chapter and make the chapter interesting by adding backstory.

Well, I don't know what level of damage your MC received, because it is not the same if they only hit him in the head, they broke his leg or even he received a bullet. In fact, I am going through a similar situation in which my MC was removed from the scene by sleeping with a drug in his drink and then subjected to a Matrix effect with the purpose of hallucinating so much as if he were in a dream, and finally forget what he were in or what he were about to discover.
But, going back to your case, I would forget about the recovery chapter and start the next chapter with the always effective phrase: A month later (or a year, a week, whatever you need depending on the situation). That, in my opinion, allows you to put a gun in your MC's hand again and here we go again, with the advantage that the reader will swallow it, he will not be arguing: well, what happened to he being out of combat? and all that. At most you can explain in a couple of paragraphs that the recovery was such and such, that he took advantage of hooking up with a nurse (or the doc, assuming your MC is a girl, right?), and voila, you can move on with history and you will not deviate.

You can also start with a cliffhanger, like: Well, there was the very wicked bad man, and the good boy was spying on him above the container, and he was going to jump on him, etc, but wait, and there you fit the explanatory paragraphs like:
Those weeks spent with one leg up were a drag, have you noticed that in hospitals (assuming) they always serve that tasteless pudding and that awful rice? And I don't even tell you when I had to go to the bathroom, what would I have given to have a beer, etc, etc. Damn, he couldn't even watch the national team game, blablabla.

Because the other idea, that of putting in a backstory, really worries me.
I mean, it already happened to me. Well, given the hallucinating thing in which my poor MC begins to think that he is dreaming because at no time can he know exactly where he is or what is really happening, and further the doctor (a woman in secret belonging to a rapid deployment regiment) has forbid him to say specific names or any something that helps the AIs to locate him and at the same time find out what he was about to find out, they are quite intrusive little robots, the point is that little theme of the backstory has already made me write 100 pages, that's why I tell you don't even think about it, because it's the quickest way to fall head first into a loop.
This is what I can think of to advise you for now, I hope it helps you.