: Re: First quarter friends As I've mentioned before, I'm working on a military sci-fi novel. Here's the trouble with the military: you don't spend all of your service, start to finish, with the same

@Samaraweera193

Vote Up Vote Down

Realism is just a style: If it serves your novel better to have your MC serve with his buddies from bootcamp --or at least some of them --just make it happen. Lampshade it, or explain it away if you must, but don't be a prisoner of realism. In fact, even according to what you say, it's not unrealistic for there to be at least a core group that progresses on together. It might strain a tiny bit of credibility if all his best friends and worst enemies "just happen" to be in that core, but I don't think that's really much of a stretch for the reader. (And if there are one or two well-developed characters that only appear in one section of the book, I don't think that asks too too much of the reader, either.)
Interweave the narratives: As suggested multiple times in answers to the earlier question, you don't have to run all the bootcamp scenes and then all the service scenes in chronological order. Weave them together and you solve both problems at once.
Bring some of the characters back later: Even if they don't all go forth together, it's not out of the question that some of the characters from the first part might reappear later in minor or major roles. Most stories with a large cast do this to at least some extent.

There are some very successful books and movies that do move from one largely self-contained world to another --Full Metal Jacket seems like a particularly relevant example --so if you want to do this, you can. But in that case you really have two or more complete stories connected by a common character, and will need to make sure that each piece is capable of basically standing on its own --of being satisfying to the reader in of themselves.

(0)

Login to post a comment!