Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

50%
+0 −0
Q&A Can I write my sub stories separately?

If you are having a huge problem getting the stories on paper because juggling both at once is confusing, then yes. I would certainly outline them individually. I prefer to write linearly — in the...

posted 13y ago by Lauren Ipsum‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#4: Attribution notice removed by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-13T12:00:00Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/4122
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T01:58:36Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/4122
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by (deleted user) · 2019-12-08T01:58:36Z (almost 5 years ago)
If you are having a huge problem getting the stories on paper because juggling both at once is confusing, then yes. I would certainly _outline_ them individually.

I prefer to write linearly — in the sense of writing the story pretty much in the order it will appear in the book, with a few exceptions for inspiration or to get around writer's block — so that I minimize the amount of backtracking I have to do. You would need to backtrack if you realized you forgot some bit of exposition or explanation, for example, or if you needed to put in some foreshadowing, or to shift a point of tension.

If you have two A-plots going on at the same time, you generally want both plots to have similar levels of tension. Whether you want them both to rise and fall simultaneously or for one to rise while the other is falling is up to you and your story. For me as a writer, that would be easier to see if I were writing the scenes in the order they would appear.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2011-10-05T11:02:41Z (about 13 years ago)
Original score: 6