Hi you all, Happy first week of Spring! I have 5 different storylines for a book series that could become a trilogy because I gathered so much material. However, outlining these storylines is quite a pain. Numerous characters in these storylines meet only sometimes. Otherwise, they are just connected by an overall plot and family ties. Have you ever tackled outlining of more than one storyline in one book or a series? Any outlining wisdom you are willing to share? Thanks in advance.
Do you plan on telling all 5 stories simultaneously? If they aren't related in ways that are substantial that could become very tedious (and often times boring) for the reader. If the stories are so disparate I would recommend breaking them each into a separate novel. I highly recommend looking at the structure of Charlie Higson's The Enemy series of novels. They pull off something similar to what you explain, in a way that I believe isn't too taxing on the reader. My other recommendation would be to make each individual story line have more impact to the others, then they may fit better as one coherent narrative.
For me, I try to have series-long arcs (character development, plot lines, etc.) but also ones that are resolved at the end of each book. So the books aren't cliffhangers, exactly - the main story for that book has been resolved. But the series-long story is still out there, hopefully luring readers to continue with the series.
I think it really all depends on how everything is tied together. The more sub-stories you have the more challenge you have, and should weave together in some fashion from the get go. Otherwise it will be like untangling a ball of multiple colors of yarn if they mesh together at the end. While not a fan of many series, and trilogies, I agree with @BayView on how to handle it. Though more of series than of trilogies, to the point that series tend to lose focus and continuity mistakes are made the longer they continue past the third or fourth book. Though in trilogies this is far less likely to occur, because there is far less time passed between the first and final installment. Though I have a theory that most writers don't take the time to re-read there work to keep such problems from occurring, as they feel they 'know' the storyline so well that they often make these errors without realizing it. So as long as you can keep your story free of continuity errors you should be fine, along with having all the sub-stories mesh into the main story.
Hi SoulFire, It is about family members that were separated and each one makes its way home. Each one makes another journey.
Thanks, Cave Troll. The outline is difficult as so much is to be considered. I could make the family smaller and cut out some story lines. There is one thing that wears on my mind. If I use five POV, do I run into the problem of not being able to develop the characters as much as I want? They have to share the book with four other story lines that is....
You can have as many POVs as you want. Though the more POVs you have the more time you have to offer to each one which means longer story length overall to develop them. There have been plenty to have more than 1-3 POVs, so go with the amount you want to. I did three for my first and sequel novel and that was enough for me to handle, and it was/is a challenge all it's own. So if you think you can handle the workload of juggling 5 POVs then go for it. Good luck.
Thanks for your advice, SoulFire. I'll check out The Enemy Series. I think it is possible that a reader likes one story line and is rather bored with the other story line. It happened to me with a couple of books. Maybe I should break my ideas into several novels. I also fear a little bit that I might not have enough pages available to develop the individual characters sufficiently as they have to share the chapters...
Well, with the series I'm currently promoting, the series-long story is about my MC coming back to the town he grew up in, reconciling himself with his childhood, and getting back together with his true love whom he left behind long ago. But he's a police officer, and each individual book has a crime for him to solve or a crime-related adventure or whatever. That ties in to the main story because his father was a criminal, his true love is a criminal, etc., so the series-story is helped along by the book-stories, but the series-story isn't resolved until the end of the final book, while the book-stories are resolved at the end of each book.
Using three acts as an example: each story has three acts and the trilogy is three acts (book 1 = act 1, book 2 = act 2 etc). Use hero's journey: each story is a journey and the trilogy is a journey. Like Lord of the Rings. Read KalBashir.com
The only thing I could think of was "resolution".....each story line needs to be resolved. Please don't do 5 endless cliffhangers in order to create a "series" . . . it's never been done and won't be - readers need resolution.