One of my favorite things to do when writing novels, especially fantasy novels, is to tell parallel stories. I either tell the same story from the perspective of two characters or tell two different stories that intersect. Currently, I am writing a novel that involves two characters in the same world but in different countries. As of now, I am alternating chapters to tell two different stories. However, eventually the stories will intersect and the characters will be very entwined. I often find it hard to keep the stories going at the same pace, and to keep all of the facts straight in both stories.

So my question is, have any of you ever tried to write two different stories within one?

I am also debating whether or not I want to eventually include the perspectives of other characters, but for now, it's not needed and would add a lot of confusion. I often debate whether or not I want to open that can of worms.

But anyways. Any thoughts on writing stories in this manner? Two stories in one or the same story from two perspectives?

I think, honestly, it depends on you and the story. That's not the most helpful answer, but it's the most accurate. Try telling the story from the different perspectives and see what 1) you like best 2) what moves the story best 3) and what the story tells about the characters. Like how do the different perspectives portray the story? Every human being sees the world differently, so how about your charries?

I'm constantly trying to do stories in differing perspectives. I love single perspective, because it's so focused on the movement of the story. I love having more than one because it delves more deeply into characters and subplots, showing you and your readers things you never would see if you just told one side of the tale.

Currently, I'm working on a sci-fi novel told from various perspectives. It started out as a double author project, while I was writing it with a friend and it made sense to have each of us tell the story from our own character so that each character had a flavor and a viewpoint on the tale, instead of a single narrative that conflicted in style and thought because it was coming from two different writers. I've kept that idea, even though now I'm working on the project on my own, because I want to tell the different stories, and I love what we put into the characters, but I'm having a hard time deciding just whose story to tell. Totally a can of worms I opened without thinking it through first. XD

And yes, pacing two different stories while they intersect is hard. Really hard, as I've found out recently. My story starts off slow, and there's really no mention of the villain, so I had to add an alternate beginning unless/until I can figure out how to fix that. Most of the story happens at the same time for the different characters, but they're not directly in synch. If you figure out a way to make it flow well, let me know.

I would definitely split different POVs into chapters or sections. You've got the right idea there. My style right now is to start each chapter like this:



It just keeps things neat, and there's no headhopping.

On the other side of things, I'm considering a suspense story told in four books, but where the story overlaps. Each book is from a character's perspective about things that are happening to all of them, but occasionally branching out to things that only happen to the one who is telling the story. I'm thinking the story starts in the first book and moves to a certain point, and when the next book picks it up, we might have gone back in time a little, but by the end, we've furthered the story--and so on. (It sounds confusing, and it really is, and I'm undecided as to whether it's the best way to tell the story. *shrug*)

On a related subject: I have an idea to write a story as a collection of short stories, told from whatever character I want to use in that moment. So it's like different perspectives in different chapters, but not limited to the main characters at any one time. There will be main characters, yes. They're the ones who drive the story forward, but the people around them get to tell their side, too. Mostly, I've been writing like this as an exercise for when I'm stuck in a story. (I'm calling it "leapfrog theory" right now...) I'll go write about something maybe the characters hear about but doesn't actually happen to them. I'll tell that bit as it happens. It doesn't make it into the novel, but it helps me get unstuck.

There are two places in my Shine Cycle (still almost entirely in the planning stages ...) where I've had ideas that seemed to require me to write "parallel stories." One was a fairly simple case of two story ideas that could each only fit in one place on the series timeline, and which required different POV characters; they've since diverged, so that one will end up being essentially a sequel to the other, with perhaps a bit of overlap in time and (I hope) no story arcs carrying over between them. The other, though, is where the series timeline needs a book or sub-series covering a fairly long war (the working title is The Longest War), but I had ideas for separate sub-series giving fairly high detail on battles and fronts that the main story wouldn't be able to do more than touch on.

As for pacing - I once read a novel that was told in two different 3rd-person-limited POVs. In the beginning, one was set about 1970, and the other around 2000. Sometimes one covered time quickly while one covered time slowly, and sometimes they were both slow or both fast, but eventually they were both in the same year and then the two POV characters met. I'm not sure if this is what some of you are meaning by pace...but my point is that it can work quite well to have two POVs covering time very differently, at least for a while.


In the novel I'm thinking of, the two POVs had very separate stories except for a few little intersections until they finally met each other in the same time. I think this helped to keep the time jumps straight.

In the same novel, the author made her time and POV jumps much easier to follow by having a date along with the POV character's name at the beginning of each chapter. But if you're writing in third-person, I think that it can often work to not explicitly give the POV character's name at the beginning of each chapter...because you'll probably start right off with "So-and-so had been hoping..." or "It was a beautiful day and So-and-so was..." (This is what Brandon Sanderson does. ) But if you find that this is getting awkward, POV character names at the beginning of each chapter may be a good idea!


My goodness! I had a very similar idea. I thought it would be interesting to tell the story of a civil war from the perspectives of many different people involved in it. Naturally the civil war would have central characters who had a lot more impact on what actually happened...but there would also be lots of side characters who were impacted by the events and who made small choices of their own. I thought it would be a neat way to explore the complexity of a civil war and come up with a bunch of different characters and conflicts, too.

Ideally (in the school of mythopoeic fiction that Sanderson fits into), your POV characters have "voices" (whether you're telling the story in first or tight-third person) that are distinct enough that by a few chapters in, the reader can tell who the POV character is almost immediately even if you don't mention his or her name for several paragraphs. Lois McMaster Bujold is the best writer I know at that (among many other aspects of mythopoeic fantasy and science fiction ...), and the one I would hold up as someone to imitate if you can.

I should investigate Bujold's work - I really don't read enough fantasy and scifi (indeed, I only read Brandon Sanderson because I discovered his kids' stuff and found that it clicked with me). If you want to give me any recommendations feel free to PM me.

I also forgot to mention in my earlier posts a book that uses the "leapfrog" style of narration that Caeli and I were discussing, with lots of short stories from different characters' points of view - Tales of the Kingdom by David and Karen Mains (and its sequels, Tales of the Resistance and Tales of the Restoration). The form really adds to the books, I think, since they're ultimately Christian allegories, and having so many small stories in one helps to present a more multifaceted view of the Gospel and Christian life.

Interestingly, this was the question I came here to ask. I'm in a Play by Post RPG and am doing scenes as the game progresses. The DM is giving me a lot of leeway, and a while back I started doing scenes about a cheap movie production recreating the actual events.

That idea has grown, and since the game is slower that real life I am thinking about interleaving chapters between the movie production and the actual events. So far it has been fun as the survivors of the event are going by pseudonyms because of the movie industry. However, a reader will be able to pick up on who's who. More importantly, it lets me allude to issues or whatever in the movie scene and the tell the actual story in the event scene. One of the character's commented on his grand daughter:

"I know." Mr Smith said quietly. "Sorry to hear about him, Marco. I liked his book. My granddaughter had to read it a couple years ago, for a class project." He paused, and looked at the toe of his shoe. "Some things you don't talk about, Marco. The memories are too strong, and too painful. She came home one day, talking about this neat history book, and how neat it was that I had been named after one of the guys in the story. She seemed to have the impression he was one of the bad guys."

"I'm sorry, sir. Honest." Marco said. "He and dad talked a lot, and dad said they wanted to make the book real so people would know the history. The truth."

"Truth?" Mr. Smith said. "Quid est veritas, Marco? Do you know history, son? Did you read the book?"

I like seeing parallel stories in different books too. It's always neat to read a story and see characters you know from elsewhere in it, even if the tales never officially intersect.