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2/ First, make your reader crave backstory before you give it to them. If readers don't care about what a character is doing, they're unlikely to care about who they are or why they are that way.

3/ Resist the urge to explain backstory. Let readers act as detectives—observing, noticing, and coming to their own conclusions based on the clues you provide.

4/ Use backstory hints to create intrigue. Sprinkle in details bit by bit as a "reward" for readers who are assembling the backstory on their own.

So the *better* version of "show don't tell" sounds like.

Here's a question: At what point does one have enough backstory to take out the back and make it a whole separate story? Am Curious.

In fact, this is pretty common! I've encountered many manuscripts where the most intense and interesting conflict is in the past and the present story is more about the repercussions of the past. That can work, but sometimes it means turning the back into the story, for sure!!

Imagine doing this several times by complete accident. You turn the backstory into main story, only to accidentally make that story's backstory So Much that now THAT is The Story, but that THAT story's backstory-