: Dropping tie-ins for future stories? During my writing I discovered some interesting (sub)adventures that my protagonists go through while reaching their end-destination. However, these stories are

@Pope4766717

Posted in: #Narrative #Storyline #Structure #Subplot

During my writing I discovered some interesting (sub)adventures that my protagonists go through while reaching their end-destination.
However, these stories are totally irrelevant to the current plot and structure so I left them out.
I was wondering however if anyone has good tips one still planting small hints/pointers towards these adventures, so that I in a future story can go back to these adventures in a seemingly natural way. (does this make sense?)

I'm writing in a third-person "character" mode voice (i.e. only observe/tell what main character does/feels) so I can't basically go writing stuff like "That's a story to be told some other time".
I also don't want the 'links/references' to be too obvious: I'm afraid they'l immediately feel out of place if I don't expand on it if the character mentions strange and miraculous adventures that happened in between the whitespace of two chapters.

Thank you in advance.

Keep writing!

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@Caterina108

@Caterina108

That depends...


Is this your first book? It's hard enough to get through your first book without getting too cute. Focus. Keep your word count under control. It's easier to pull out little details or expand on bit characters in retrospect than it is to subtly advance them.
Are you writing a series with each novel intended to stand alone? Again, it's easier to find loose ends from Story A to put into Story B, but there's nothing wrong with dropping in an occasional character or artifact as long as they have relevance in Story A and aren't just tools. Readers pick up on this, and it annoys them
Are you writing a series with each novel being part of a whole (one book doesn't tell the entire story)? This is where you absolutely want to foreshadow events; however, the writer should have a thorough outline so that it's not just a bunch of random threads coming together and drifting apart - unless you're writing an existentialist novel in which case this might be the point.


If your brain consistently wanders far afield, you may want to do an outline. This will give you ample structure to at least predict where things can be dropped in.

Don't assume there will be a Story B. Give your best ideas to Story A and don't be afraid to edit out the rest.

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