Building Blocks for Playing with Time: Ideas for Crafting “Then-Now” Narratives
According to author Kekla Magoon, choosing the structure of your novel is a question of optimal presentation, an analysis of how to tell your story in “the most coherent way, to achieve the greatest impact” (Magoon). Most writers ultimately decide that the most coherent, impactful way is via linear storytelling: a sequence of scenes that follow a chronological, cause-and-effect trajectory. As a reader, though, I’ve always been drawn to stories that break this mold and play with time: after all, how many of us actually think about the “scenes” and events of our own lives in chronological order? Don’t most of us structure our personal narratives based on patterns, themes, and beliefs, regardless of the sequence of how these defining moments actually occurred? In fact, doesn’t all self-narration and reflection require a bit of hopscotching through time, as we search our own “stories” for meaning, purpose, and answers?
Despite my reader fascination with nonlinear narratives, as a writer, I find them wildly daunting. I think most of my wariness stems from the fact that there are no real guidelines for structuring nonlinear narratives — no “Arch Plot” or “Hero’s Journey” equivalents, like there are for traditional chronological stories. A writer who wants to tackle a nonlinear narrative must build her story’s overarching structure from the ground up: but if “what happened next” is beside the point when determining which scene should follow another, where does a writer even start?
Fortunately, there’s a lot of nonlinear “story precedent” out there, and if one reads enough titles and resources on the subject, common types or “blueprints” begin to emerge. There are nonlinear novels that follow two seemingly unrelated stories set in different timelines, for instance, which eventually converge and inform each other (with Melinda Marchetta’s Jellicoe Road being one exemplar). Then there are nonlinear novels that follow two related stories — the same characters, in two different time periods — with these “then” and “now” timelines usually hinging around a significant event or series of occurrences: I refer to these types of stories as “Then-Now Narratives” throughout this discussion, and use John Marsden’s Checkers; Nina LaCour’s We Are Okay; and Jandy Nelson’s I’ll Give You The Sun as examples. There are also far more complex nonlinear forms that rise to the level of temporal mosaics: where a story’s scenes jump around in time, and conform to no immediately-apparent order. Valerie Hunter aptly calls these novels “Narrative Chaos” stories in her VCFA critical thesis on the subject (and Amy Huntley’s The Everafter is a good example).
At various points in the “story conception” stage for my own work-in-progress, I considered using all of these nonlinear blueprints as a foundation for building my narrative. Ultimately, though, I settled on the Then-Now Narrative model, as it seemed the most natural fit: after all, I knew certain critical events that happened in both the “Then” and the “Now” that were integral to the story of my protagonists, Arwyn and Sam. I also knew there were certain secrets these sisters were keeping from each other . . . and had a general sense of how I wanted Sam and Arwyn’s timelines to dovetail at the end.
But after making this commitment to the Then-Now Narrative form, I was at a loss for how to think about all the scenes that fell in between the beginning and the end. I wondered if most Then-Now Narratives shared certain characteristics. How did these authors go about arranging their scenes, if they couldn’t rely on the question of “what happened next?” How did they integrate their scenes from different timelines, so that they felt like one cohesive, seamless story? How were these scenes constructed to maximize emotional impact and reader involvement? Or in other words, what could I learn from these Then-Now Narratives, and apply to my own work-in-progress, “Hartland”?
The Then-Now Narrative: A Tale of Two Arcs
As Emilee Newman Bowles posits in her web post about nonlinear stories, any “parallel timeline” narrative naturally involves a “plot A” and a “plot B.” She explains that “[p]lot A serves as [a] secondary timeline that supplies information to help resolve plot B . . . [but a] big key to writing successful parallel timelines is to make sure the past is directly related to the present and impacts the story’s resolution, as well as the main character’s reconciliation” (Bowles).
Bowles’ conclusion underscores the importance of dovetailing one’s timelines together to create a cohesive and impactful narrative, but her analysis also rests on a crucial assumption, one I didn’t fully understand until I analyzed several Then-Now Narratives. Indeed, both timelines of a Then-Now Narrative must harbor a plot, including but not limited to plot points, a turn, climax, and an emotional arc. Each timeline has its own narrative force and story trajectory, even if one trajectory ultimately works in service of the other.
Consider, for example, John Marsden’s nonlinear novel, Checkers. Marsden’s “Then-Now” narration opens in present day, with an unnamed girl in her asylum bed, listening to the nurses outside of her room (I’ll refer to Marsden’s protagonist as “the MC” throughout, for ease of reference). After a brief opening scene, Marsden immediately begins to toggle back and forth between the MC’s present-day experiences in this institution, and the story of what happened to her and her family in the past.
Marsden structures the scenes of the MC’s “Then” narrative chronologically, beginning with the evening that her father’s lucrative, secret business deal goes through — the same night that Dad brings home the MC’s new puppy, Checkers. Marsden’s “Then” timeline subsequently recounts, via piecemeal scenes, the public’s eventual discovery of Dad’s uncouth dealings, the surrounding scandal, and the devastating way in which the MC and her dog, Checkers, become caught in the crosshairs. But Marsden’s “Now” timeline, which easily could have devolved into a framing device, follows its own plot arc as well. At the story’s opening, the MC is presented as a withdrawn girl, one who doesn’t participate in group therapy or befriend the other female residents. Eventually, though, over the course of the “Now” narrative, the MC bonds with another young woman, grows to understand and learn from her therapy group’s hardships, and ultimately shares her own story with them. Yes, the MC’s “Then” timeline is clearly the engine that drives Marsden’s story forward: but both timelines undeniably have their own plot and story trajectory, which makes Checkers a more compelling and rewarding story.
Like Marsden in Checkers, Nina La Cour employs a “Then-Now” Narrative in her Printz Award-winning novel, We Are Okay. LaCour’s “Now” chapters are set at the protagonist Marin’s college in New York, where Marin’s estranged best friend Mabel has come to visit. Marin’s “Then” chapters, by contrast, take place during the summer before college, when Marin lived in California.
Within the first chapter, readers learn that Marin’s beloved Gramps has died, that Marin subsequently fled from California to New York, and that Marin has refused to explain what happened with Gramps: indeed, Marin and Mabel haven’t spoken since Gramp’s death. This “Now” timeline centers, for the most part, around the pair’s strained visit, and whether Marin is ultimately strong enough to trust Mabel with the full story of Gramp’s death and betrayal. While LaCour’s “Now” narrative is quiet, it’s also effective: this “Now” story has an inciting incident, a turn, a climax, and heaps of conflict as the two estranged friends attempt to reconcile in the wake of earth-shattering loss.
But LaCour’s “Then” timeline also has a story arc as well. Marin’s California chapters chronicle her final months with Gramps, her navigation of her burgeoning sexual relationship with Mabel, her increasing concern over her grandfather’s mental decline, and ultimately, her discovery of Gramps’ lifelong betrayal. LaCour’s “Then” story portions are not one-off memories, or vignettes solely meant to impart necessary backstory. Rather, this timeline’s scenes work and build upon each other, forming a compelling, plotted, forward-moving story — even though this “Then” story ultimately services Marin’s “Now” timeline.
Like Checkers and We Are Okay, Jandy Nelson’s I’ll Give You The Sun can also be characterized as a Then-Now Narrative, but with an interesting twist: Nelson’s novel tells the story of two twins, Noah and Jude Sweetwine, who each narrate one of the novel’s two parallel timelines. Noah’s “Then” narrative occurs when the twins are thirteen; Jude’s “Now” narrative takes place after the sudden death of their mother, three years later . . . when the twins’ relationship has completely fallen apart.
Just like the timelines in Checkers and We Are Okay, both of Noah and Jude’s timelines in I’ll Give You the Sun are start-to-finish story trajectories in their own right. Noah’s “Then” timeline, for instance, features 13-year-old Noah, a brilliant and creative young man whose greatest dream is being accepted into the prestigious local art school, CSA. Noah is also in the process of falling in love with his male best friend, engaging in an increasingly intense war with his popular sister Jude for their mother’s affection, and uncovering family secrets that, eventually, shatter his world. Jude’s “Now” timeline, by contrast, centers around 16-year-old Jude, a superstitious loner who is nearly failing out of CSA. Jude decides to petition a new mentor for help in making a sculpture that her late mother would be proud of . . . a sculpture that might give her the confidence to confess the devastating secrets that she’s been keeping from Noah. In the process, Jude eventually forms a friendship with this intense, grief-stricken mentor, and begins to fall in love with his protégé. In other words, both of Nelson’s timeline stories are multifaceted, fleshed-out narratives: narratives with beginnings, middles, and ends, each with their own plot points, turns, and climaxes.
Armed with this new understanding, and returning to my own work-in-progress, “Hartland”: I now realize that my initial conception of my story’s “Then” timeline was more “randomly inserted memories” than “clear narrative trajectory.” Originally, I’d envisioned Sam’s “Then” scenes as simply a means to supply Arwyn’s “Now” timeline with crucial backstory, and information about the sisters’ shared fantasyland. But now, after studying these Then-Now Narratives, I realize that I’m missing an opportunity. Giving Sam her own secondary plot will likely lend balance to my manuscript, make Sam’s chapters more compelling, and hopefully create a more cohesive and enriching reading experience.
The Then-Now Narrative: A Mystery in Disguise
Kekla Magoon likens nonlinear narratives to puzzles: stories that the reader receives in pieces and must slowly put together to create a full picture. She explains that this alternative structure assumes there is “specific value in the revelation and withholding of information . . . too much mystery is confusing, but a focused amount of mystery can tease a reader beyond belief” (Magoon).
The challenge for a writer then, is to determine the optimal balance of questions asked and questions answered, as we move across timelines and from scene to scene. Or as Varian Johnson explains in his “Nonlinear Narrative” lecture, the order of scenes must be intentional: the story’s structure must lead the reader to discern “how and why these scenes are in relation to each other.”
Consider again John Marsden’s Checkers, and the first scene in which readers are introduced to the main character, the MC. Immediately, readers begin wondering, why is the MC in this institution? What are the “[s]o many new things that have happened” that brought her here? (Marsden 4). Why is she obsessed with the dog in the painting hanging on her wall? And who is Checkers?
Marsden then jumps back in time, to his story’s “Then” narrative, and we learn that Checkers is the new puppy that the MC’s father brought home as gift, in celebration of his company’s secret business deal. Thus this second scene answers one of our initial questions: but it asks several more, which keeps the pages turning. Where is Checkers now? And why does Dad’s new financial deal have to be kept a secret?
Marsden continues to toggle between “Then” and “Now,” giving his readers selective, pertinent information while also teasing his readers with more questions. For example, we’re clued in early on that there’s something meaningful about Checker’s name: “When we told Dad later that we’d chosen ‘Checkers’ he looked quite shocked. ‘Is that a joke?’ he wanted to know” (14). Which leads readers to wonder: why is the name Checkers so significant? How does this dog relate to Dad’s financial contract? What role is this dog going to play in the MC’s commitment to an institution?
Of course readers know that, eventually, we’re going to get the whole story: despite her initial reluctance to confess what happened to readers or her peers, the MC has been writing her memories in her journal, and throughout the novel, her group therapist continues to actively encourage her to share her story. As the MC tells us, “I was getting scared, like I was going to spill my guts, and I didn’t want to. But I did want to, too” (99).
Eventually, the MC does share the full story. She blames herself for her family’s downfall, because she inadvertently talked to a reporter about Checkers’ origins. The reporter used the dog’s information to link her father to the prime minister (also a dog owner: his pup is the spitting image of Checkers), which essentially confirmed that the two met, colluded, and that there was financial foul play. In a reactive rage, Dad kills Checkers, and the MC breaks down with grief, and withdraws from her life. These answers we’ve been waiting for feel both shocking and inevitable, given Marsden’s strategic dolling of clues and information throughout the course of his novel.
Like Marsden in Checkers, LaCour also employs techniques of the mystery genre in We Are Okay to great effect. LaCour tells readers in the very first chapter that Gramps has died, and that Marin is heartbroken. But LaCour also hints that there is much more to the story, that the events of Marin’s past are actually haunting her. What exactly happened? Is Gramps’ death the only reason for Marin’s depression? And why does Marin not want to see her best friend, Mabel? Marin comments, upon Mabel’s arrival, that it’s “the first time I’ve heard her voice since everything happened” (LaCour 13) . . . but what is everything?
With each scene, however, we’re given another piece to help us put together Marin’s story. In Marin’s first “Then” chapter, for instance, we learn that Marin has lived with Gramps since Marin’s mother died (when Marin was three) . . . but that there was also an interim period when Marin lived with family friends, because “Gramps had to spend some time in the hospital” (28). Though LaCour doesn’t elaborate on the nature of the hospital or the extent of Gramps’ visit, the cryptic statement piques our interest as to why. Readers also learn that Gramps kept a locked separate room, and that his grief is unstable and easily slides into rage: we witness this early on, when Gramps snaps at a young nun for urging him to share memories of his daughter with Marin (33). We learn, too, that Gramps lost his daughter to a surfing accident, and that Marin sometimes catches him walking through the high, dangerous tide, looking lost (62). Each of these scenes gives readers another tantalizing piece about what happened, and keeps them reading to complete the puzzle.
In the novel’s final act, LaCour unveils the remainder of Marin’s secrets in a sequence of fast, page-turning chapters worthy of any mystery: Marin tells Mabel that Gramps had a hidden room full of mementos of her mother, but that he kept it all to himself. She confesses that Gramps struggled with mental illness. She confides that he likely died from suicide. Marin also lays her grief raw: if Gramps could lie to her and leave her alone in this world, how is it possible that he ever loved her? The answers to LaCour’s “What happened” mystery are shocking and devastating, and yet they also seem inevitable, because LaCour laid the groundwork for this unveiling from the beginning.
Jandy Nelson’s I’ll Give You the Sun, too, reads in part like a mystery: a mystery of what happened in the space between “Then” and “Now.” We learn early on that the twins’ mother has died: as Jude bluntly tells us in her opening, Mom’s “car sailed off the cliff two years ago, killing her on impact” (Nelson 25-26)). But readers glean that this can’t explain the entire disconnect between “Then” and “Now.” Why is Jude the one at CSA and not Noah, if Noah was the artistic prodigy? Why is Jude, who wore bright dresses and lipstick in Noah’s “Then” timeline, “Now” a recluse without friends who has sworn off all boys? And why are these twins, who used to call themselves NoahandJude, acting like total strangers?
Like Marsden and LaCour, Nelson uses the sequence of her scenes strategically, consistently raising new questions and considerations to tantalize her readers — and with each scene serving as a new puzzle piece. We learn, for instance, that Noah and Jude’s lifelong battle for their mother’s attention eventually slides into an aggressive war. Jude resents Noah for have more artistic talent; meanwhile, Noah lashes out at Jude for being jealous (76). Noah begins to fall for Brian, the boy next door, and Jude eventually retaliates by choosing Brian to kiss during a game of “seven minutes in heaven” (136). Readers feel the twins’ tension mounting more acutely in every scene. By the story’s second act, we get the distinct sense that there’s an explosion to come in the “Then” that destroys the “Now”. . . and yet we still don’t know the ultimate means of detonation.
Nelson continues to give her readers pieces about “what happened”, while small hurts become big hurts, and small lies become big lies. When Noah and Jude finally confess their biggest betrayals — the secrets they’ve ultimately been withholding from each other — all of the pieces of Nelson’s Then-Now narrative click together like a classic whodunit. Her strategic scene structure and staggered, well-timed reveals allow the ending to feel both surprising and deeply satisfying.
Which leads me to ask . . . what can I take away from these insights, for “Hartland”?
It’s become very clear to me that I need to embrace the idea of my story being a mystery, regardless of whether I call the work-in-progress a “contemporary with speculative elements” or a “portal fantasy.” To that end, I need to begin to look at each of my timeline’s scenes in terms of the questions they ask and the answers they provide: what do readers need to know right now? How can this information be best conveyed, and what subsequent scene would best reflect or showcase or complicate this information? How can I infuse every “Then” and “Now” scene with more mystery?
The Then-Now Narrative: An Echo Chamber
The discussion thus far has been focused on the overall trajectory of Then-Now Narratives: the threading of two separate but related plots, and the strategic organization of individual scenes to create maximum impact. But authors of Then-Now Narratives also build story connectivity between, within and across their scenes by using what Varian Johnson calls “motifs”: repeated uses of certain phrases, endowed objects, or other sorts of narrative cornerstones, to thematically and emotionally anchor the novel. These motifs, Johnson stresses, can showcase character development and growth, create additional intrigue, and stir emotional resonance in readers.
Consider again LaCour’s novel, We Are Okay, which uses the “motif” of ghosts in various ways throughout its Then-Now Narrative. Marin thinks about Gramps as a “ghost” (45), for instance, and often frames her memories of her old life in a similar fashion: “Even the good places are haunted. The thought of walking up [Mabel’s] stairs to her front door, or onto the 31 bus, leaves me heavy with dread” (94).
Many of Marin’s school scenes in the “Then” timeline, too, revolve around literary ghost stories. In the “Now” timeline, Marin draws repeated connections between herself and the protagonists of these ghost stories: for instance, when Marin is about to sleep beside Mabel (for the first time in months), she compares herself to Jane Eyre, and her unrequited love for Mr. Rochester (117).
At the novel’s conclusion, Marin and Mabel actually watch the film version of this classic novel: and it’s during this viewing where Marin finally processes what happened with Gramps, and that she must choose to move forward. As Jane Eyre concludes, Marin’s epiphany comes with it: “For a few minutes, Jane believes that she’ll be happy, and I try to believe it, too” (230). LaCour’s employed “ghost motif” thus serves not only as an apt extended metaphor for Marin’s haunting past, but also as a vehicle for Marin’s character growth. This use of “ghosts” across both timelines creates the sensation of an echo, of meaning and thematic resonance intensified by repetition.
Marin’s college major, as well, operates as a running motif: a litmus for her current state of mind that shifts and changes in notable ways throughout the course of LaCour’s novel. In Marin’s “Then” timeline, she declares that she’s going to be an English major. She explains her love of literature as she debates with Mabel on her paper about The Turn of the Screw:
“It’s better if it’s complicated,” I said.
Mabel turned in her desk to face me. “Wait. Excuse me? It’s better if it’s complicated?”
“Of course it is! It’s the point of the novel. We can search for the truth, we can convince ourselves of whatever we want to believe, but we’ll never actually know.” (24)
Compare Marin’s celebration of ambiguity above with how Marin currently feels in the “Now” timeline: the following exchange takes place in present day, soon after Mabel comes to visit. Mabel asks Marin which college classes are her favorite, and Marin answers:
“Everything in lit is just too . . . ambiguous I guess.”
“But that’s what you like. All the differences in interpretation.”
Is that true? I can’t remember.
I shrug.
“But you’re still an English major.”
“No, I’m undeclared now,” I say. “But I’m pretty sure I’m going to switch to Natural Sciences.” (18-19)
LaCour makes it clear that even academic decisions like, what am I going to study? have been corrupted by Marin’s tragedy. Her angst over whether Gramps’ love was “real” permeates every inch of her mental space: given what she’s just endured, why would Marin ever torture herself with pouring over texts that, by their very nature, have no clear answers? These two wildly disparate conversations intensify our understanding of Marin and her transformation between “Then” and “Now,” simply by showing us Marin’s shifting opinions about literature.
Nelson, too, uses a repeated motif in I’ll Give You the Sun to intensify her story’s interconnectivity, and this “motif of art” ultimately makes her novel feel richer and multifaceted. In fact, Noah’s entire narration is framed in terms of artistic “portraits” and “self-portraits.” After Mom compliments Noah’s sketchbook, for instance, he describes his state of mind as “SELF-PORTRAIT: Boy Dives into a Lake of Light” (22). In similar fashion, Noah reacts to Jude’s increasing chides and jealous digs by picturing a suitable way to draw her: “PORTRAIT: My Hornet Sister, no: PORTRAIT: My Spider Sister, that’s better, full of poison and skittering around in the dark on her eight hairy legs” (76).
Nelson also uses art as the yardstick to measure the twins’ character development and change. When Noah learns of his mother’s infidelity, for instance, he reacts by quitting drawing and silencing his traditional mode of self-expression: “Then I enter the crawlspace deep inside me and shut the hatch. Because I’m not coming back out. Ever. SELF-PORTRAIT: Untitled” (342). Jude’s character transformation is also measured through her relationship to art. During the course of her “Now” timeline, she studies under the tutelage of the sculptor Guillermo Garcia, trying to work a slab of stone into a sculpture that would make her mother proud, that will break her shackles of guilt, and that will somehow save her relationship with Noah.
Art is also the means through which the twins eventually experience catharsis. Once Jude confesses to Noah that she’s the reason he was rejected from CSA (she never mailed his application), Noah is elated, as his talents are finally validated: and he throws himself into finishing an expansive mural. Jude’s finished sculpture becomes a testament to her emotional journey too, a symbol of her repaired relationship with her brother, as well as a means for better understanding her art-loving mother.
It’s also notable that most of Nelson’s crucial scenes and epiphanic moments take place in museums, around the prestigious CSA art school, or in Guillermo’s studio. Art is a central motif to Nelson’s Then-Now family portrait: a catalyst for her characters’ change and growth, as well as a source of catharsis.
So what can I glean from this discussion for my own work-in-progress?
While I very consciously decided to use the “Lockhart Guide” as an endowed object in my “Hartland” manuscript, I can absolutely use motifs to greater effect. For instance, I could echo some of Dad’s lines from the past to reverberate meaning into Arwyn’s present. I could also more fully integrate the “Wild West” motif of Hartland into Arwyn’s language, memories, and way of seeing the world. Perhaps there are objects from Sam’s timeline that can show up again in Arwyn’s, and vice versa. I think that taking the time to think about these potential “echoes” could result in a much more cohesive and connected story.
The Then-Now Narrative: A Hall of Mirrors
Repetition in Then-Now Narratives, however, isn’t always confined to endowed objects and turns of phrase: the use of secondary characters can also create this sensation of echoed meaning across timeliness, and lend another note of story synergy. And there’s even more opportunity for multifaceted perspectives on secondary characters when a Then-Now Narrative involves two different narrators.
Consider again, for example, Nelson’s I’ll Give You The Sun. The art model that Noah draws in his “Then” timeline ultimately becomes Jude’s love interest in the “Now.” Guillermo Garcia, Jude’s sculpting mentor in her “Now” timeline, is revealed to be Mom’s secret lover, late in Noah’s “Then” chapters. This interweaving of the same players across time and space adds further depth and nuance to Nelson’s nonlinear narrative, and makes readers’ experience that much more immersive.
Which leads me to my final takeaways for “Hartland” . . . could there be anyone else in Sam’s timeline who can make an appearance in Arwyn’s timeline? Similarly, is there any character in Arwyn’s timeline who can serve “double-duty” by becoming an important player or catalyst in Sam’s timeline? In other words, how can I use the secondary players that I already have to begin building my story into a more complex and immersive hall of mirrors?
This study of Then-Now Narratives was extremely helpful, and gave me concrete ideas and considerations for moving forward with my own nonlinear story. I now understand that I need a more robust and complete story arc for Sam’s “Then” timeline, for instance, and I’ve started to flesh out that trajectory. I have also begun to look at my story like a mystery: analyzing my scenes as “strategic opportunities” for dolling out clues and information, and looking for where I can tease additional questions and intrigue. I’ve started to think about where and how I can use additional motifs, as well as how I can more effectively utilize secondary characters in both timelines of my story. And finally, while I still think nonlinear narratives can be daunting and time-consuming, through this process I’ve realized that they also might be as rewarding to write as they are to read.
WORKS CITED
Bowles, Emilee Newman. “Writing a Nonlinear Timeline.” Eschler Editing, 2019, https://www.eschlerediting.com/writing-nonlinear-timeline/.
Hunter, Valerie. “‘Time is a Line, But We Are Circles’: Navigating Non-chronological Young Adult Novels.” Dissertation, Vermont College of Fine Arts, 2015.
Huntley, Amy. The Everafter. 1st pbk. ed., Balzer Bray, 2010.
LaCour, Nina. We Are Okay : A Novel. Dutton Books, an Imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2017.
Magoon, Kekla. “Dare to be Different: Using Alternative Narrative Structures.” 11 January 2015, Montpelier, Vermont College of Fine Arts. Lecture.
Johnson, Varian. “Nonlinear Narrative.” 18 January 2018, Montpelier, Vermont College of Fine Arts. Lecture.
Marchetta, Melina. Jellicoe Road. 1st American ed., HarperTeen, 2008.
Marsden, John. Checkers. Houghton Mifflin, 1998.
Nelson, Jandy. I'll Give You the Sun. Dial Books, an Imprint of Penguin Group (USA) LLC, 2014.