Timeline

[Freelancer]

My question would be the following: what do you prefer when you read a book. A continuous time line or which is not?

I'm asking this, because in our present WIP I've shuffled the story a bit to get more twists at the end of the novel. So in the time line Chapter 1 plays between Chapter 23 and 24. The WIP can be divided to two parts, light and dark. Chapter 1 presents the dark side almost right from the beginning, while Chapter 2 starts the real story from the real beginning and it's quite peaceful comparing the first one. And up from Chapter 2 to Chapter 23 the story evolves as it must. The essence is, this method is giving twists and also I'm able to present almost all the main characters in Chapter 1, be it good and evil (Of course a twist waits the reader when (s)he arrives to this time at the end of the novel and will learn the exact meaning of CH1, which is quite different as it first appeared to be. But between CH1 and CH23, almost 700 pages are existing.). My concern is, if we would drop this part, the other main characters, the evil ones would be introduced quite later, around Chapter 9.

So, my question is, if you would write this novel, would you leave the time line on this way or as a reader, would like this sort of setup in a novel or not?

If you don't want to explain your decision, just please add a +1 into the comment if you would keep it on this way, or -1 if not.

[Witch_turtle]

I'd say as long as you can keep it from being confusing, a "jumpy" timeline can be quite interesting. I especially like the idea of reaching the end and learning what the beginning really means, I find it a promising idea as long as it is done well and with a twist that is actually original...which is not easy.

The Time Traveller's Wife has quite the interesting timeline, and I think the key was the way in which everything fell together. Same thing with Atonement, sort of, (although I only saw the movie of that one) If you can pull off that awesome "falling into place" thing, go for it, because those are the best stories, whether they are told chronologically or not.

Either way, sounds like you want to write it in mixed up order, so why not go for it? Either it turns out well or it doesn't. You can always get some opinions on the actual piece and change it around later if needed. You aren't writing in stone, right? :)

Good luck!

[Freelancer]

Thanks. Yes, the twist at the end is a similar one. When you read Chapter 1, the you're going to believe what for everyone would originally think. A simple story. But at the end, the reader will realize almost every sentence, every little detail had a double meaning in that chapter and nothing is what they appeared to be at all.

[Cliff Face]

The bad guys in chapter one - are they present through chapters 2-23? It doesn't entirely matter, but I just had a thought - in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight, there's a prologue which introduces the element of the bad guys, and so when I was reading the book, all while Bella was at school I kept thinking, "He's the bad guy, no, I bet it's that guy." Then it turns out the bad guys don't get introduced until virtually the last minute.

Bit of a let down, really.

Anyway, just a thought. I'd keep it how you want to keep it, but be aware of the negatives involved in keeping it that way for when you're dealing with editors! :)

[Freelancer]

Yes, the bad guys are also present in the later chapters (They're introduced relatively soon. Nothing like Twilight.). So the actual time line would look like on this way...

Chapter 2-23 (Bad guys are appearing in these chapters.)
Chapter 1
Chapter 24

[Danthia]

Shuffling the story works fine as long as the reader can keep up, and the story moves forward regardless of what pieces are shared when. I think you'd get into trouble if you were reorganizing just to make the end twist work. If the whole book is a setup for that, if could make the rest of the story feel like it wasn't going anywhere. (not saying you're doing this, just suggesting a possible pitfall to look out for).

You also want to be careful you're not setting the reader up for a fall. If the opening is there to trick them, and you basically lie to them the whole book just to say "Ha ha! It was all really THIS!" you run a big risk of pissing them off.

[Freelancer]

We're not going to lie to the reader; just simply presented a situation what you can understand on two different ways. The first standard way is like as everyone would understand and that's chapter 1. But the double meaning, the real meaning is at the very end of the story.

I'm using the following approach: if you don't know what the premise of something, what the real background is, you might get the wrong picture and may draw the wrong consequences. In Chapter 1 you don't know what the premise is, so you surely get the wrong picture and going to get the wrong consequence. But when you arrive to the last chapters, you'll see everything works on a different way, but there you already know the premise of everything. There is no "HAHA, you, my dear reader sucked". No. It's just a philosophical element, which is also got a meaning in the story at few places and at the end, the reader also going to understand it.