Keeping Track of your Buildings - or - How Not to Get Lost in your Own Stories

[CarmineBlancheJr]

So, I am writing this series, The Chambers House, and about the second chapter, I realized I was getting lost in my own house and in my own story. I realized that in a house with only three main levels, a basement,and a secret room I had not disclosed yet in the series, my main character had walked up several more floors in the house and into rooms on the wrong floors.

Yes, I do know how to fix this, and I have, though I think there might be a slip or two in Chapter Two. For fun's sake, I am leaving it in.

In my case, I created a document with the floors and a list of each room and its description and anything else about the floor that needs to be known. I thought about drawing an actual map but then figured that would be overkill as long as I recall the place's layout.


But it did cause me to wonder if any of you have fun stories about not getting your continuity right with your stories and if people pointed it out to you.

 

[THBGato]

I just use real buildings and places that I know well. Sorry, not much help.

 

[CarmineBlancheJr]

I just use real buildings and places that I know well. Sorry, not much help.

Dont apologize. It was just something fun I thought of as I tried to figure out where the fuck my character was and thought it would be a fun question to throw out into the community.

Thanks for responding, though. I appreciate it.

 

[StillStunned]

But it did cause me to wonder if any of you have fun stories about not getting your continuity right with your stories and if people pointed it out to you.

I'm a pantser, so I'm forever trying to remember to go back and add in details so that a later story element makes sense. Or to remove something. Sometimes I forget, or I'll remember that I have to change something but I can't remember what. Recently I was working on the ending of a story, and realised I'd have to go back and include a detail. But then I went with a different ending, but in my head I still had to go back to make the change.

The only inconsistency that's made it into a published story, as far as I know, was one of my first S&S stories here. I described the FMC's dagger as "slim" in one scene, then "broad-bladed" in another. That's the only time I've asked for a published story to be edited.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

I use an Excel spreadsheet to storyboard and track the details within a story. (I tend to include A LOT of detail)

This allows for better continuity within the immediate story, but also for when characters, scenes, or plot elements may prove useful in a future story.

 

[Bazzle]

I am aware in a couple of my stories, the design of the house- for plot reasons- had to change between chapters.

 

[MrPixel]

I solved that problem right off the bat by having the MCs buy an old-world, downtown 6-story hotel in need of renovations. If a room or scene wasn't quite right for a plot bunny, two chapters of fun were about enough to remodel the room/bar/lobby/café/elevators/whatever. That particular story has 22 published chapters and 28 in the wings.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

If it's a house or location my characters will be spending a significant amount of time then I'll sketch out a basic floor plan. It helps not just for continuity purposes but it's a bit of a reality check. Does this house make sense as a house? Would someone actually build something that looked like this?

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

So, I am writing this series, The Chambers House, and about the second chapter, I realized I was getting lost in my own house and in my own story. I realized that in a house with only three main levels, a basement,and a secret room I had not disclosed yet in the series, my main character had walked up several more floors in the house and into rooms on the wrong floors.

Yes, I do know how to fix this, and I have, though I think there might be a slip or two in Chapter Two. For fun's sake, I am leaving it in.

In my case, I created a document with the floors and a list of each room and its description and anything else about the floor that needs to be known. I thought about drawing an actual map but then figured that would be overkill as long as I recall the place's layout.


But it did cause me to wonder if any of you have fun stories about not getting your continuity right with your stories and if people pointed it out to you.

Draw the map.

 

[MelissaBaby]

This is akin to what I think of as the “Alvin’s Boat Problem.”

In my series, Mary and Alvin, Alvin’s boat is practically a supporting character. They go sailing on it on their first date, they first confess they are in love to each other on its deck. Many key scenes take place on the boat.

The problem is, the size and the shape of the boat kept shifting to accommodate whatever whatever action I placed on it.

For a while, I fretted about the inconsistencies, but eventually I realized that, while some readers must have noticed them, and one commenter did pint them out, nobody but me really cared.

I filed the Alvin’s Boat Problem in the Small Stuff Not To be Sweated drawer

 

[CarmineBlancheJr]

This is akin to what I think of as the “Alvin’s Boat Problem.”

In my series, Mary and Alvin, Alvin’s boat is practically a supporting character. They go sailing on it on their first date, they first confess they are in love to each other on its deck. Many key scenes take place on the boat.

The problem is, the size and the shape of the boat kept shifting to accommodate whatever whatever action I placed on it.

For a while, I fretted about the inconsistencies, but eventually I realized that, while some readers must have noticed them, and one commenter did pint them out, nobody but me really cared.

I filed the Alvin’s Boat Problem in the Small Stuff Not To be Sweated drawer

Kind of an extension to "The Ship of Theseus" question? Instead of parts of the ship being replaced, parts keep getting added. Or a seabound Tardis... bigger on and below deck. ;-)

 

[Djmac1031]

Only time i ever really needed a diagram was for my story, Apartment 409.

it's a Voyeur story, so I needed to lay out the main characters apartment and the one next door to him so I could accurately figure out what he could or could not see and / or hear from his neighbor.

I think my biggest continuity error was in my series The Jenna Arrangement.

in the very first chapter in described the day the two characters met as a "beautiful, warm evening."

But as the story progressed through multiple chapters and time passage into summer i did some date crushing, and for my time line to make sense they would have had to meet in February.

Now I suppose February could be warm weather depending on where one lives, but here on the east coast USA it's generally cold and miserable. And while I never specified where the series takes place i kinda had easy coast in mind.

I'm the only one who obsessed over it though. No readers ever bothered to notice a detail that small lol

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

Only time i ever really needed a diagram was for my story, Apartment 409.

it's a Voyeur story, so I needed to lay out the main characters apartment and the one next door to him so I could accurately figure out what he could or could not see and / or hear from his neighbor.

I think my biggest continuity error was in my series The Jenna Arrangement.

in the very first chapter in described the day the two characters met as a "beautiful, warm evening."

But as the story progressed through multiple chapters and time passage into summer i did some date crushing, and for my time line to make sense they would have had to meet in February.

Now I suppose February could be warm weather depending on where one lives, but here on the east coast USA it's generally cold and miserable. And while I never specified where the series takes place i kinda had easy coast in mind.

I'm the only one who obsessed over it though. No readers ever bothered to notice a detail that small lol

Just place it in Texas. We often get all four seasons on the same day.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

This is akin to what I think of as the “Alvin’s Boat Problem.”

In my series, Mary and Alvin, Alvin’s boat is practically a supporting character. They go sailing on it on their first date, they first confess they are in love to each other on its deck. Many key scenes take place on the boat.

The problem is, the size and the shape of the boat kept shifting to accommodate whatever whatever action I placed on it.

For a while, I fretted about the inconsistencies, but eventually I realized that, while some readers must have noticed them, and one commenter did pint them out, nobody but me really cared.

I filed the Alvin’s Boat Problem in the Small Stuff Not To be Sweated drawer

I'm mixed on that. As a reader, that sort of thing bothers me. Not to the extent that I'd feel a need to comment on it, but I do feel it takes me out of the story when I stop to wonder, "wait a minute, Frank bumped his head in this cabin last chapter and now he's got Becky on his shoulders in here..."

I'm working on a story set around a sailboat right now, and I have a specific model of sailboat picked out and namechecked in the story. So, if any of my readers wanted to they could go look at the plans for the boat and I'd hope it would feel familiar after reading the story.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

Only time i ever really needed a diagram was for my story, Apartment 409.

it's a Voyeur story, so I needed to lay out the main characters apartment and the one next door to him so I could accurately figure out what he could or could not see and / or hear from his neighbor.

I think my biggest continuity error was in my series The Jenna Arrangement.

in the very first chapter in described the day the two characters met as a "beautiful, warm evening."

But as the story progressed through multiple chapters and time passage into summer i did some date crushing, and for my time line to make sense they would have had to meet in February.

Now I suppose February could be warm weather depending on where one lives, but here on the east coast USA it's generally cold and miserable. And while I never specified where the series takes place i kinda had easy coast in mind.

I'm the only one who obsessed over it though. No readers ever bothered to notice a detail that small lol

Florida is on the east coast, and we have plenty of warm February days...

 

[Djmac1031]

Florida is on the east coast, and we have plenty of warm February days...

probably should have specified northeast

 

[Kelliezgirl]

probably should have specified northeast

I'm sort of fighting that same battle. I set a clear start date for the story, and it really works for the story. Unfortunately I'm trying to balance flow of the story and the need for time to pass with the onset of cold weather which would make some things I want to do unrealistic.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I see my locations very vividly in my mind, and based buildings on places I've known, so I don't make those kinds of errors often, but some of my stories' timelines don't match up. Most of the published ones aren't too bad, but I've got an draft I've worked on for a couple years and decided I just have to accept that it's 5 years out of sync with the same characters in a different story (eg a couple get married in 2014 or 2019 depending on which story you read).

I live in hope of readers getting invested enough to notice. I tell myself that Elinor Brent-Dyer wrote a hugely successful series of 63 books (The Chalet School) despite key characters changing names, relative ages, and appearance regularly, and glaring continuity errors - the highlight being the same baby being born twice in one book, three months apart! And she was paid for it. In comparison, I think I'm doing OK.

I do ask beta readers to keep track of clothing - I had one bloke taking off his shirt repeatedly, removed two instances, but the beta pointed out he'd done it again...

 

[Kelliezgirl]

I see my locations very vividly in my mind, and based buildings on places I've known, so I don't make those kinds of errors often, but some of my stories' timelines don't match up. Most of the published ones aren't too bad, but I've got an draft I've worked on for a couple years and decided I just have to accept that it's 5 years out of sync with the same characters in a different story (eg a couple get married in 2014 or 2019 depending on which story you read).

I live in hope of readers getting invested enough to notice. I tell myself that Elinor Brent-Dyer wrote a hugely successful series of 63 books (The Chalet School) despite key characters changing names, relative ages, and appearance regularly, and glaring continuity errors - the highlight being the same baby being born twice in one book, three months apart! And she was paid for it. In comparison, I think I'm doing OK.

I do ask beta readers to keep track of clothing - I had one bloke taking off his shirt repeatedly, removed two instances, but the beta pointed out he'd done it again...

In one of my stories that unexpectedly turned into a series the MMC starts out as 22. Based on details later revealed I probably should have made him 25 or 26.

 

[TheWritingGroup]

In "Pranked", the main character struggles to stay awake for 48 hours.

It was only during the last edit before publishing it that I realized: I had it daylight that entire time (or at least, didn't mention it being night).

-Annie

 

[Rob_Royale]

I've got a rough (real rough) sketch of the house from my Freebody Manor series. It's the only story where it seemed to matter.

 

[CarmineBlancheJr]

probably should have specified northeast

I recall being in South Carolina in January once and was like, "Where the hell is your guys' winter?"

 

[MrPixel]

I'm the only one who obsessed over it though. No readers ever bothered to notice a detail that small lol

Hmm. I sort of did. The rainstorm that kick-started the arc and the lake episode did get me to thinking of an unevenness in the timeline. Didn't bother me enough to mention.

I haven't spent any time lately with your friends; mine have been keeping me pretty busy. I need to catch up.

 

[Djmac1031]

Hmm. I sort of did. The rainstorm that kick-started the arc and the lake episode did get me to thinking of an unevenness in the timeline. Didn't bother me enough to mention.

I haven't spent any time lately with your friends; mine have been keeping me pretty busy. I need to catch up.

I've always been very vague about where the series takes place because it wasn't really important. I kinda consider it Everytown, USA.

And I didn't really start thinking about an actual time line til I wrote the prequal chapter from Jenna's point of view as diary entrees. Because then I needed dates, so had to go back through all the previous chapters to figure out how much time had passed.

I had to work backwards to determine actual calender dates; if they went somewhere on a Saturday I wanted that Saturday to correspond with an actual Saturday on the calendar.

The rain storm & lake visit chapters took place in May, and working backwards from there and counting the time gap between their first and second meeting led me to chapter 1 taking place in February.

in my defense of course, the entire series was strictly seat of my pants writing and I had no idea after writing chapter 1 just how far it would wind up going lol

 

[MrPixel]

in my defense of course, the entire series was strictly seat of my pants writing and I had no idea after writing chapter 1 just how far it would wind up going lol

I know nothing, I see nothing! My two series are totally out of control. I counted 50 chapters (28 not published yet) in the hotel story, and 19 in the polyamory tale, with 5 more in the wings.

Common to both, however, is I pay tight attention to timeline. It's one of the reasons the hotel series is still mostly in the can, avoiding writing myself into a hole where I might need to stretch or squeeze seasonal references 10 chapters prior.