Memories of a previous timeline

[l8rose]

So one of the stories I'm writing involves a previous timeline (about 4 years) that got undone after the deaths of the main characters. One already remembers everything in order but the second has been regaining their memories in dreams. For this story, he gains them in a reverse timeline from the moment of his death or when it's triggered by something that happens in the rest of the story (kind of like my excuse for doing exposition).

That got me wondering. If you were writing the story (or reading I suppose), what narrative feels better?

 

[RepresentingPride]

I have the same plot and I put some important moment in them, but they are not reverse from his death (Thought the first one is his death), and some are triggered by event in the story, like a city being destroyed.

 

[Sylver]

I do like the events being triggered by other parts of the story direction, it serves as an interesting way to introduce exposition in guiding the reader through the story. But after what they did in the Last of Us 2, where halfway through one story, the game hits the pause button and requires the player to follow through a different perspective for around the same length of investment, so for example if it took 8 hours to reach that point, you now had to play 7 hours from a different point to catch up, yea that direction kind of turned me away from that route.

I'm exaggerating for humor, I'd say if you want the characters memories to resurface in that way go for it. But don't go too far with flashbacks. When flashbacks take too long, it feels tedious and you run the risk of either getting your audience to lose investment in the main story in favor of the flashback, or to lose track of the story altogether.

Telling the story in present order is the easiest and simplest way to do it as well, hence why I vote for that. Sometimes, limitations inspire creative solutions through challenges, but ultimately it's up to you. Either way, I'm interested to see how your story turns out

 

[QuercusMalus]

I like the idea of the memories being triggered by a current event. Just like with real life, something can trigger that memory. They can be distant or hazy, incomplete or detailed, jarbled or organized. For quick drama have a horrible memory get triggered at an inconvenient time.

 

[Hans.Trondheim]

Honestly, I love to experiment, so whatever works.

 

[melchi]

IDK, going into a trance to re-experience something that happened in a past life seems like a speed bump to me.

A better question would be, how can you use this kind of narrative without causing the plot progression to come to a stop?

 

[greyliliy]

Non-linear story telling is always fun, but it definitely helps the narrative if the flashbacks serve a purpose in pushing the story forward. How you do that is going to be subjective and relative to your story, though. Lol.

 

[Deleted member 84247]

Sometimes, you have to do non-linear storytelling to explain things. If the story starts with the hook of a war, you can use flashbacks to explain how the war started. My biggest gripe with non-linear is more on authors who cut the current part of the story off at a bad time, or the way it's set up is bad and only serves as exposition dump.