How to Plan and Structure Multiple Plotlines in Your Stories

hello and welcome I am km wiland and welcome to what is kind of a unique experience for everyone um if you're watching this on YouTube then you probably know that throughout the last year I've been posting um shorter videos in a Q&A format throughout the past year and um as the year progressed those videos kind of started getting longer and longer true to form for me and just taking more time than I really had available to work on that if I wanted to continue working on the other content I produce as well but I really

wanted to continue doing the videos so this year I'm going to do something slightly different and that is offer the videos um not just on YouTube but on my podcast so if you're listening to this on the podcast you may already tell that this is kind of a different experience because I have um always scripted my podcasts and this is going to to be more extemporaneous um with me just uh talking so who knows what I'm going to say uh don't worry for those on the podcast the regular format um will be back um but

I will be doing probably one of these um videos um video/ podcasts throughout the year as well just to just to keep up with the video because I enjoy doing that and also as an experiment to see you know what people resonate with and and what you like um so we'll just be playing with that so if you are um a podcast listener then really the only difference that you're experiencing here is as I say it's more extemporaneous and not scripted if you are a YouTube listener then the good news is that this format means

that I will be including a transcript which you can find on my website at helping writers become authors and which I will link to down below so if you'd rather read or listen then you have some format options to access this information um the other thing I will say is as you can probably hear I'm kind kind of getting over um a cold I'm still getting over my Christmas cold um also it's very cold here today and my nose is cold and it's running a little bit so I have a little bit of a frog

in my throat and I apologize for that okay so today we're going to be diving into the topic of multiple plot lines and this is in response to a question that I received on the blog from Amanda who asks I would love a practical guide to outlining multiple story lines even if you just have a b Story how do you outline for it and make sure it aligns with the main story and this is a really important question to ask because so often I think as authors we think you know when particularly when we look

at some of what's popular right now that we need to have multiple plot lines and we need to go bigger and better and have more more more and that's great obviously there's a lot of fun in that um and a lot of um ways that we can really explore um some fictional options through that format but the key is it has to all work together you know just throwing a bunch of plot lines into say the same story world doesn't necessarily mean that they together are going to create the most cohesive or resonant story so

thinking about this and asking how can I create that kind of resonance in the outlined phase or as I'm planning it is great and so important for creating that foundation so as with most things the foundation of this all comes down to structure and it's really about how do you take story structure the principles of story structure and the major plot points the first plot point the midpoint pinch points Etc and then apply that to something that isn't just one storyline isn't just one story arc and still make it seem like something that readers can

follow and pay attention to and that ultimately makes sense on a deeper level of character art and thematic resonance so there are several different ways that we can look at this several different ways that we can find multiple plot Lines manifesting within stories and these are primarily you have dual plot lines and this is um what happens when you have basically two concurrent stories happening in the same book and what's going on in these stories generally is that you're trying to explore different facets of larger story um with the intention almost always of bringing those

together at some point either late in that story or late in the series and when we do this it's it depends on where you're going to bring it together in the end so if you're telling one book then you're just trying to funnel it all down to the climax of that story but if you're telling a series then you may be telling book after book after book which is in which basically you're telling two or more separate stories within each of those books until finally in the final book which is book 20 or whatever in

your series then you're pulling them together so throughout what can be a very long series you could be telling stories that don't obviously have any connection now readers are going to trust that you are going to bring that together in the end and that it's going to matter and obviously there probably will be some you know continuity if they're happening in the same world very often there will be kind of an overarching antagonistic Force that's the characters are if not specifically facing in early books then at least kind of the general idea of like we're

all going to end up having to deal with this at some point um a very obvious example of this type of story would be Game of Thrones in which you have this huge series that really is like just encompassing a whole world um and and different cultures within that world and different people who have no idea of the existence of the other people and are just kind of following their own own little plot lines um but from the beginning there is this sense of like yeah this is all going to funnel in the same conflict

um which in this case you kind of have the multifaceted conflict of The Game of Thrones who's going to you know ultimately Rule westros and also the battle against the ice zombies so there is always from the very beginning from that very first chapter the sense of that overarching antagonist and that overarching threat that's affecting everyone of the impending ice apocalypse and that kind of Grants continuity and cohesiveness to what otherwise is just a bunch of random stories about a bunch of random people um so that's in that that's one way that you can approach

multiple plot lines in a story another is multiple timelines and this too in many ways can be the same thing in that you're dealing with totally separate stories about totally separate characters who have no idea about the exist existence of each other um however often what you'll see in stories like this is you will either have a character in the modern time who is aware of the character in the historical time the previous time and is interested in them for some reason they're researching them or learning about them is impacting their life in some way

or it could be that the characters are the same in both plot lines in both timelines um in which case you're telling the story of something that perhaps happened in the character's childhood and then telling a concurrent story about something that's happening to them later in life and allowing those stories to comment upon one another and finally another um way to think about or approach multiple timelines is through that of multiple povs now this is specifically talking not just about um a story in which you have a main POV and then you know there's little

povs inserted here and there to give color or to explain things you know here and there but when you are purposefully using multiple povs to um create you know simultaneous arcs within the story um this could be either because you're telling the story concurrently from the protagonist's point of view and the antagonist's point of view this is used very commonly in the romance genre in which you will have um you know both leads featuring um an equal amount of screen time within their POV so that readers can experience their inner Journeys as they're you know

working toward the same ultimate goal of being together in this story now all of these um are ultimately going to be approached in one of two ways and that is simply either they're completely separate and so they're going to be structured separately or they do intertwine to the point that the the structural beats the plot points in one section affect that in the other other section so let's address the first one first and if you're writing a story like say Game of Thrones in which the plot of one story line doesn't necessarily or immediately have

any obvious effect on the plot line in a second story then you're dealing with basically two separate stories and as such you're basically going to be structuring them as such this means that each one needs to have its own um set of structural beats so each each plot line within your story will have its own um first plot Point its own pinch points its own midpoint its own third plot Point Etc until whatever point they begin to intertwine and affect one another and again if you're writing a lengthy series that may be quite late in

the series you may have multiple books that go on and on and on without these stories ever intersecting in which case you will have complete structures complete story structures for each plot line from book to book to book now obviously you know there's that's complicated it's complicated enough to plot one book much less to do multiple ones um and that's something to consider when you're deciding whether you want to do multiple plot lines if it's really worth you know the effort and the complication to create this this very difficult juggling act and often it is

because these can create amazing interesting stories and and particularly in genres such as fantasy where you have giant worlds it gives you the opportunity to explore different facets of the cultures and and things like that rather than just zeroing in on one tiny little little piece of it but the key is that you need to be able to structure them in a way that creates cohesion and resonance not just for each plot line on its own but together now when we're talking about structure one of the first consider considerations is that of timing and it's

important to remember that structural timing basically is all about pacing right so when we present structural timing um let's say the first plot point we want it to land at the 25% Mark we want the midpoint at the 50% Mark we want the third plot point at the 75% Mark Etc and I've talked about this in great detail on my site and in my book um structuring your novel so if you're interested if you're unfamiliar with um structure or the timing of the structural beats or things like that then you can definitely go deeper with

that in some of the other resources which I will link to on my blog and um Down Below on YouTube so when it comes to structural timing um in any story what it's really all about is pacing so we present the ideal timing which helps us make sure that we have enough time to balance the action and the reaction of each section of the story in each structural bead and what it's intended to offer in this creation of a psychological Arc which is story but that timing is like I say it's just an ideal it's

a guideline and what it's really all about is the pacing so it's all about is there enough time to develop what needs to be developed here without beating it to death right without boring readers because you're dragging it on too long that is really all the structural timing is all about now when you are dealing with the complications of multiple timelines um one of the questions that I think people often ask is well you know like it's literally impossible to have two first plot points two completely separate first plot points happen together at the same

time at the 25% Mark or whatever else if you're dealing with a different structural beat and that's totally true you know I mean if you're really going to town on a particular structural beat it could take chapters to get through through a sequence of scenes that is meant to dramatize and create this um so what's important here is not so much that every single plot point in every single plot line ends up at exactly the right timing but rather that it ends up within the right timing within its own structure so let's just say that

you could separate out the um entire plot line of one story from the other and just look at its word count and its timing and its pacing then you'd want you'd still want it those plot points to happen generally at those um ideal moments of structural timing but then you're going to like mix all those up together right all the scenes from the two different plot lines and that timing becomes different within the overarching timing of the book and that's fine that's totally fine um one way to approach the timing of multiple plot lines is

to just kind of plan it so that each the plot line let's just say the first plot point from story a happens and then immediately after that you move over to story B and have its first plot Point happen so it's bing bing bing right each plot point is happening basically at the same time within the story one after the other and that's great that can be a really good way you know to just keep that really tight timing within your structure but it doesn't necessarily have to be done in that way um again it's

really more about the timing of plot points within the individual plot line the individual story that's happening for each plot line within the overarching book um in which case you can mix and match and you can really like just instinctively feel into the timing and how the scenes flew together well because the other factor of making this work and of pulling two or more multiple plot Lanes together into a cohesive hole is that you really want them to feel as if they're part of a the atic hole right and since in this instance we're dealing

with storylines that at first glance don't have anything in common with each other and aren't immediately affecting one another then you have to look for other ways in which you can create that seamless effect for readers so that there is a sense of you know not that they're reading two different stories but that they're reading two pieces of a larger hole so looking for ways in which you can create kind of a thematic mirroring between one plot line and another is really helpful and again one of the most important or two of the most important

ways to create theme to dramatize theme within a story are through comparison and contrast so you can think of ways in which you can you know time scenes and create scenes within the multiple plot lines so that they comment upon each other in a in a way that doesn't have to be specific and by that I mean it doesn't doesn't have to be that it's literally commenting upon something in the other plotline but through the patterns that are emerging through the behaviors of one characters and the consequences that they're facing in one timeline and so

forth and so on or sometimes even just like the visual symbolic motifs that are rising it allows you to create comp comparison and contrast between the two because after all there should be a reason that you're sharing both of these stories both of these plot lines in the same story like they are related there is a thematic uh cohesion a thematic relation between them so really mind that look for that and how they how different things relate to each other how the actions of characters excuse me characters in one section can can cast a mirror

or just create an interesting commentary on the actions of a character in the other plot line and then deciding you know how to arrange those scenes and how you show them with within the overarching story so that there is a sense of you know continuity As you move from one to the other even if you are not strictly you know aligning all of the structural beats okay so that is talking about stories in which you have multiple plot lines that don't interact with each other for most of the story but which you know should by

the end intertwine in a way that um is important so that both are commenting upon and are necessary in go to the climax because if they're not then they probably don't belong in the same story they probably really are separate stories and should be told that way you want to make sure that everything does funnel down into that climax together and that they what has happened in both plot lines up until that point is important in informing and allowing what happens in the climax so that's multiple plot lines that do not affect each other until

the end but then we also have stories in which we have multiple plot lines in which which um they intertwine with each other throughout the story and very often this happens in situations in which the characters who are involved in the separate plot lines know each other and are aware of each other and they may even be specifically working together toward the same overarching goal um let's just say they're in a police investigation there are like two like branches two different branches of the police who are working toward the same goal you know you might

have detectives and and um forensics or something like that and so they're both working toward the same goal but they're operating completely separately right they have different jobs they're doing different things and you want to explore both of those in depth and the experience of the characters as they're doing this um it could also be that the characters you know that they're in a story where they aware of each other they're you know they have a shared goal to the point that it's going to bring them back together in the climax but they go their

separate ways and so for most of the story they're not together they're off doing their own thing following their own plot Lane throughout the story but they are aware of each other and they what they're doing ultimately is impacting each other in a way that is more um immediate than you would have in the other type of story where the plot lines are not intertwin and then you also have stories where this is really obvious like say romances where the characters are concurrent like they're running concurrent tracks throughout the entire story they're aware of each

other for the entire story and their actions immediately impact each other um in pretty much every scene but you're still trying to tell a very individual story for each character um you know for instance I just read a romance in which one of the characters was a basketball player and his plotline was kind of rehabbing his his injured knee and the other character was dealing with a messy breakup with her ex and so they were stories that ultimately all contributed and affected the main through line of the relationship but which you know the one character

wasn't necessarily directly involved in what was going on in in the other character's plot line so when structuring a story with multiple plot lines that works like this what you're going to be looking at more so than in the other type of story is where one character's plot Point immediately affects the other characters plot point it's also totally possible that they just share plot points that they you know maybe they're separate throughout most of the story but they come together at those structural moments like the first plot point and the midpoint Etc and act together

to create that structural through line which creates a really nice tight um sense of integrality to your story structure even if the characters are separate for most of the rest of the story so in these instances you're either going to have your characters coming together at the plot points and acting together to create those moments or the actions of a character in one plot line are immediately going to affect that beat for the character in the other plot line and again a mystery is kind of a good example of this in that perhaps you know

forensics comes up with you know a really important clue that's their plot point but then the detectives take that clue and you know go look for the bad guy maybe have an encounter with the murderer that kind of thing so there's just kind of a immediate cause an effect a domino effect to how those plot lines interact and are intertwined with one another okay so the final thing I want to talk about here is subplots um or story b as we sometimes talk about them um the thing to understand about subplots is in essence they

are exactly the same as any other multiple plot line the difference is and perhaps the distinction here at least as I'm making it is that they're smaller right um when we talk about a multiple plot line we're talking about a concurrent story line with a full story structure that's happened that's given just as much time and space as the other story line and is happening throughout the entire book a subplot is something that takes much less space within the story and is kind of just um I don't want to call it an afterthought because if

it's an afterthought it should not be in the story um but it's just it's a side dish right it's not as important as the main stuff however this is super important um a subplots have to be integral to the main story if you can pull them if they do not matter when you by the time you get to the climax then they probably should not be in the story a subplot just for the sake of having a subplot is not a good idea a subplot just for the sake of wanting to explore some little aspect

of your story or your character if it doesn't contribute to the larger structural hole is not what you want in your story so when you're looking at a subplot or really any multiple plot line really you really want to ask yourself about the bottom line in your story is does is this going to matter to the climax if I pull it can the climax still happen that is the question you need to ask yourself assuming the answer is yes then really the way you're want going to want to think about approaching a subplot isn't that

much different from what we've just talked about the options for approaching any story with a multiple timeline and really the best and tightest way to deal with a subplot is to make sure that it fits into the story's overall structure and its plot points um it could be depending on how big and much space your subplot needs um if it doesn't need much that all you're going to do is just have it show up at those plot points even if it isn't directly influencing the main plot points it might show up with its own little

mini um plot weight that doesn't have to have a huge effect it's more again more of a pacing thing that's just reminding readers yeah this subplots here and it's important one of my favorite examples of this is from my favorite movie The Greatest es or the Great Escape um which is the classic uh World War II movie about the prisoners trying to escape from the German um prison of War camp and usually when people think about this movie if you're familiar with it they think of it as a Steve McQueen movie um when really Steve

McQueen is a subplot character for most of this story um the main through line of this story is the British prisoners trying to escape they're planning a great big giant escape where hundreds of people are going to escape the prison and Steve McQueen's not into that he's not a part of that for the entire story he's just in and out like he's doing his own thing his entire story pretty much consists of him trying to escape getting caught getting thrown into the cooler getting out trying to escape again now this is an integral subplot because

what he's doing throughout the movie does actually become important to the main plotline by the time we reach the third act so it is integral to what's happening it's not just an extraneous vehicle for steamqueen to do his thing throughout this random movie but the other thing to recognize and I think one of the points of Brilliance in this movie is that if you look at structure Steve McQueen shows up at every single plot point and that's about the only time he shows up until the third act so they were able to weave this kind

of random seemingly random subplot into this the overall story in a way that seemed pertinent and that kept him familiar and in front of viewers by syncing what he was doing by syncing his subplot to the major plot points as they happen throughout the movie until like with with any plot any multiple plot line they were ready to you know segue him in to the main plot there in the third act so that's just something to think about as you're considering subplots I have to admit I kind of cringe whenever people talk about subplots because

I think a better way to think about these things is to think of them as part of the larger hole the idea of a subplot often conjures up something that really is extraneous to the larger hole and it's you know sometimes we need those little extra things that come in and inform stories but I think it's much better to think of them as something that is contributing to the larger hole and should ideally be synced up with that larger hole's um story structure okay so that was my long video about um multiple plot lines I

have talked about this quite a bit more um on my blog um and in the podcast and I will leave links to to that on my blog and down below if you want to go into this in more depth but ultimately really the major thing to understand if you're contemplating multiple timelines in your story is that it's all about structure and theme it's all about how does this affect the overall structure of the story or the series how is each individual plotline structured in a way that is cohesive and solid and how do they thematically

comment upon one another to prove that they really are two pieces or more of the same hole so I hope that was helpful I hope you will leave me a comment if you're on YouTube or stop by the blog at helping writers author.com to tell me what you think about this and to um talk to me if you have any more questions or you need any clarification about what we're talking about or to just share some examples of some of your favorite books or movies or shows that feature multiple timelines and did a really good

job with it if you um are watching on YouTube and you would like to connect with um all of the content that I create the podcast that I do every other week um things like that all of the new products and things that I create my my e-letter you can do that by stopping by the site at helping writers beome author.com mailinglist and if you'd like to keep up with me in real time every day you can join me on Instagram at author km wiland and I will see you again later happy writing