Narrative Mode
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Narrative Mode is your primary manuscript-order workspace. It displays all scenes from all subplots on the outer ring, organized by act divisions (default 3 acts, configurable in Settings → Acts). Each act spans an equal segment of the 360° circle. This view emphasizes Narrative time (the order readers will experience the story).
- Structure: Scenes are distributed across Act 1..Act N (based on your Settings → Acts → Act count).
- Book or Saga scope: Use the book selector in the tab title bar to view one active book or Saga, which combines all configured Book Manager profiles into one narrative-order timeline.
- Subplot Colors: The outer ring segments are colored by their subplot. This lets you quickly visualize which plot threads are dominant in each section of the book.
- Publishing markers: When chapter markers are enabled, small outer-ring placards show publishing structure from your active PDF layout. C marks chapter starts and P marks part boundaries for layouts that print Parts.
- Story Beats: Displays story beats (like Save the Cat) along the timeline, helping you pace your narrative structure.
- Interactive Reordering: You can drag scenes on the outer ring to reorder them. See Reorder Scenes for details.
- Recent moves overlay: Narrative Mode can show a top-left list of recent committed scene and beat moves. Toggle it in Settings → Advanced → Configuration.
The title-bar book selector controls which manuscript the timeline shows.
- Choose a book to inspect one Book Manager profile.
- Choose Saga to combine all configured books into one multi-book Narrative timeline.
- Saga scope is available when more than one Book Manager profile is configured.
- Saga scope stays in Narrative Mode, because multi-book scene order is a narrative-structure view rather than a chronology or progress view.
Narrative Mode can show publishing-aware placards on the outside of the scene ring:
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C — a
Chapter:field starts a chapter at that scene. - P — the selected PDF layout prints a Part opener at that act boundary.
- P/C — a Part and Chapter begin at the same boundary.
These placards reflect the novel PDF layout selected in the Manuscript Export modal. For example, a layout that prints chapter openers can show C markers, while Modern Classic can also show P markers for Parts. Changing the selected export layout updates the timeline markers after the layout is saved.
When a scene belongs to multiple subplots, the outer All Scenes ring must choose one color. You control which subplot wins:
- Click a scene: Sets its dominant subplot. That subplot's color is used for the scene on the outer ring, taking precedence over all others.
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Folded corner indicator: Each subplot ring shows a small folded corner motif at its start. The corner has three states:
- Missing — the subplot is not assigned to this scene.
- Gray — the subplot is assigned but is not dominant.
- Darker hue of the subplot ring color — this subplot is dominant and expressed on the outer ring above all others.
- Reset: Use Settings → Core → Configuration → Reset subplot color precedence to clear all manually assigned dominance.
This mode hides status and progress stage overlays to keep the focus on story structure and the weaving of subplots.