I'm still in very early stage of implementation for my new saga. After a lot of brainstorming, I have decided that the perfect structure for my story will be having two main characters, one before and one after a time skip that happens after an important event and third person limited POV. Since the protagonist, the main plot mover of the story will go around a lot, and a big part of the second part will be the mc looking for her and trying to keep up, I think this is the best way to have unpredictability and plot twists that fit the overall premise. Did anyone write a book with a similar structure? Did you like it? Tips?
I use a similar narrative structure in my own WIP The lead protagonist is an up-and-coming criminal mastermind The first-person narrator is one of her two lieutenants / best friends Though not exactly for the same reason: my narrator and my protagonist are joined at the hip for almost all of the most important scenes – barring the opening and the climax – and even when they're not right next to each other, they're almost always in communication with one another. (I also personally use the term "MC" to refer to the protagonist, rather than to the POV narrator. This is apparently a semi-significant source disagreement that I had not previously been aware of )
I'm going with a third person limited narrative too at the moment, but I may switch to first. I'm also going with what I think is called 'outsider POV'- my MC is one character, the POV character is another. But they will still be together for most of the book- with a third character that decided to elevate himself from bit part to third main in this last draft. I think outsider povs work best when the narrator is with the MC for most of the book. This is an opinion so it might be you could pull it off, but I would be wary of the 'following the protag around' sort of deal.
Okay I think I worded it bad initially because it was late and I was tired. But essentially I meant that I would be wary of having your MC be not 'on-screen' for a major section of the book. I do think it might be possible to pull it off, but my knee-jerk reaction is that you'd end up making it more about your POV character and their struggles to find or catch up to the MC. If it's the MC's story, we should see the MC going through these things. Their struggles, their triumphs, their falls and their faults. Having those happen 'off screen' and then having the POV character come along behind them and seeing the aftermath would risk loosing those things that make it about the MC and turn it into something else.
