Structure
Parallel plotlines
Also known as: braided narrative, multi-strand plot
An architecture that develops two or more separate storylines side by side, often converging by the end.
Parallel plotlines in fiction: 5 works
Alternating chapters braid Shevek's past on Anarres with his present on Urras.
Multiple characters' braided storylines converge across the years around a shared artifact.
Alternating strands follow the evolving spiders and the desperate human ark in parallel.
Each visited life is a parallel storyline the protagonist tries on in turn.
Its parallel universes braid together as versions of the same characters collide.