Timelines and suspense novels

Xmas Carol, my horror novel, is suspenseful -- which means the timeline is critical. Everything has to fall into place, smoothly and easily.

While reading the novel this week I became aware of a subtle timeline snafu. As a result, I changed a few dates and moved four scenes into new positions in the book. Now I'm reading the two chapters in which those scenes appear, to make sure there are no conflicts. Other than this, things look good. Those never-ending edits seem to have done the trick. I'm very pleased.

Almost there, kiddies. Once I fix the timeline, the book will be done. And then I'll have to face unknown horrors at Amazon and the iBook store as I try to format my book to meet their specifications. I'm not looking forward to that. But hey, I'm almost done!

Timelines: Aaaarrrrgh!

Timelines are a difficult aspect of writing fiction, at least for me. I create scenes and assemble them into a book, and it all makes logical sense to me. But then at some point I have to fit the fictional activities on a real calendar. Because in the end, the story must be in synch -- all the clocks have to chime in unison.

As a writer, you just write. You know your story needs this or that, so you write scenes and make those things happen. Often these scenes are not anchored in time. They just float around in book-space until you nail them to a clock. The problem comes when, even using a trowel, you can't jam all the scenes into a coherent timeline. 

This is where I am now with Xmas Carol. It's not a huge problem. It just concerns a three-day space, into which I must fit about five days worth of scenes. I'll have to compact them somehow. Sigh. I'll get it, but still: grrrrrrrrrrrr!

Today will not be an easy editing day, but I'm on it.