So how much time passes in your story?

Yikesy mikesy, it’s been too long since I did anything on Writer’s Block. Let’s see if I can change that.

If there’s one thing I’ve started to notice about my work, it’s this: huge percentages of my stories take place over a surprisingly short amount of time. One file’s started and done in a couple of days’ time. Another one has a good eighty percent of its events unfold over one particularly nasty Saturday. In one instance, an entire story arc is done before the sun even starts to set. It’s an eerily-constant facet of my writing.

I’m guessing it’s not an inherently bad thing (emphasis on “guessing”), and I suppose being aware of the constant now will help me out when it’s time to extend my tales. But it got me thinking about how I’m doing in comparison to others — and thus, I’m here to spark a little discussion with you tropers. Relatively speaking, from start to finish how much time passes until the resolution? Do you think it’s good or bad that you’ve got that timeframe in mind? What sort of timeframe do you prefer writing — or as a corollary, what timeframe do you WANT to write?

Just some questions to get you guys — and me — thinking. In any case, if you’ve got something you want to say, by all means say it. I’m all ears. Or pixels, in this instance. Being made of ears would just be silly.

What you're describing is the Extremely Short Timespan. /Shameless Self-Promotion

For Manifestation Files the first draft started the May before my narrator's current school year, but currently, it starts in the end of September/beginning of October, and it ends in mid-December. The timespan is quite long, and it reflects some of my own beliefs in writing (eg, that romance should have time to develop.)

My plans for the moment is to end the trilogy either in the August of the following year, or full circle back in September/October.

My series takes place over the course of (well most of it barring the early Time Skip) several years interspersed by Time Skips. Some arcs take place over the course of weeks to months with the chapter itself focusing on a single day or mention of several days' passing.

The calendar also frequently doesn't match up to what season it is. Because the calendar is set for Earth when the scene in question is on another world. Meaning it's springtime in one chapter on one world and in the same timeframe it's autumn on another. In one instance it mentions it's summer in December when twelve months earlier it was late winter owing to the planet in question having a very long orbital period.

Curses! Diddled again! *hides under blanket in shame*

But seriously, though...yeah, I hear you on the whole "romance takes time to develop" bit. I'd say that's a key advantage to letting a story take place over a longer period of time — relationships can develop more naturally and believably. I'd assume that you can try to circumvent that little issue by having characters know each other prior to the story, but...well, sometimes that's not always an option, I guess.

Truth be told, that's something I wouldn't mind writing someday. Being able to write a story on such an epic scale (for lack of a better phrase) is something I envy, and really helps increase the magnitude of the adventure. It'd be cool to have characters able to look back on things at the near-end of the story and think of how far they've come.

Halo: Unggoy Odyssey is a little tricky to settle a timeline for, because the events seem to pass faster than I want them to. The titular Unggoy should take from 2549 to 2552 to become a slave, go to war, be captured by humans, and then rescued, but it's hard to fill three years with material. From the looks of it, I have enough for two months in each, but it'd better if they could fill a year. I've considered something like him getting put in stasis or whatnot, but after three battles his repeated fighting and survival seems to get boring, as is being held prisoner and farming.

Didn't help that I had been intending for him to participate in a key battle mentioned in the canon, the Battle of Draco III, which was particularly known for its savagery, but the canon marched on and declared that it occurred in 2545. Figures.

edited 7th May '13 9:29:43 PM by Tuckerscreator

A lot.

Usually a few months (mostly the summer), with a few years in between volumes.

The main body of the story takes place over the course of about a year.

The various side stories and essential plot miscellanea take place over the course of several thousand years, with most essential events taking place fifty, five hundred and one thousand years prior to the main conflict.

The overarching meta-structure of the tale is scattered across millions and even billions of years, the outer edges of the story ultimately encompassing the lifespans of multiple worlds and civilisations across a number of universes.

Scale is important.

The outer story takes place over ten days.

The flashback sequences cover seven years (2003-2010) although there's one brief section that describes how the main character's parents met in The '80s.

Time in the protagonist's Dream World is flexible, and it's implied that centuries or millennia pass over the course of the outer story's ten days.

edited 8th May '13 2:47:50 AM by Wheezy

It's a work in progress but i think my first book will cover about 10 years ( not counting additional flashbacks to characters' childhoods). The trilogy should cover closer to 25 years. However I do spend whole chapters on eventful days and single sentences on univentful months.

My current book takes place over 14 days. I actually don't recommend doing that to yourself; what day it is becomes important, which in turn makes it a real pain in your ass to keep track of.

Example; there's a scene where one of the characters is supposedly calling around to various construction businesses trying to get intel on them. Unfortunately because of other information given about what day it is, the character would be doing this on a Sunday when a good many businesses are closed. So something has to change now.

I'm starting a six book series that takes place over roughly a year and a half. The first three books are just a little over a month each, though.

All of my comics are going to take place over at least a year or two.

September to November 2009 for my first story. Guess what year I started writing it in. Actually you could probably guess the month from that too.

A few years for my Run and Gun game concept.

At least 20 for my Action RPG concept (although there are multiple time skips in between).

The timeframe for In The Service/A Numbered Existence is deliberately vague, though in-story references make it clear that at least year passes and more probably two. I might actually nail it down for the final chapter. Monsters, however, covers a timeframe of no more than thirty minutes.

Night Life is 3+ years, mainly as a result of a time skip which the interludes partially fill in.

Life After Hayate is at 3 weeks and counting.

edited 11th May '13 4:32:34 AM by Night

The first Melahawk book takes place over several months, probably four.

Five years, with several Time Skips.

The first book is nine years later (the year is 2015).

The second book is a week after the events of the first book.

In most of my completed Fan Fic, events happen in one day/night. That's actually a trend of mine. I chalk it up to Real Life, and how a lot can happen in one day/night.

The Ultimate Adventure (it's Only called that because I couldn't think of a name for a story about a time traveling Ninja with elemental powers,) has a timeframe of a year and a half. Though each insallment has a timeframe of about a month with about a week, or so taking place inbetween the installments.

The first installment of DayWalker (a story about vampires with the most powerfull among them able to walk in daylight,) has a timeframe of about two months, with only two time skips, the second one has a timeframe of about five months and theres a year time skip inbetween the two.

Yah, I'm not good at writing small timeframes.

edited 29th May '13 10:43:42 PM by david

Most of my stories take place within a single day.