Quote:
Originally Posted by VydorScope
When I have my reader hat on, for the most part I do not like it. It is one thing to have a flash back scene or three... another thing entirely for the book to be completely out of order.
As a writer... it could be fun to try and do well!  |
Yeah, the trick seems to be to do it sparingly, and not to stray from the linear format
too much, lest your audience gets lost.
And speaking of
Lost 
; When they stuck to one person's flashbacks an episode (more or less), it was easy to follow the non-linear flow --and those who watched may remember, a change to and from flashbacks was usually accompanied by a sound, almost like the roar of an incoming wave that cut off abruptly at the change, so you had an audible clue to the switchover. (Really just a replacement for the old "ripple-fade" that TV shows used to use until the ripple itself became a parody.)
The only way to accomplish the separation of two timelines in books that has ever satisfied me has been breaking them up into chapters (as I did in Despite Our Shadows). Using any other separating element (such as the extra line break or "~" within chapters) tends to get confusing, unless it is used for nothing else.