Thread: Putting the actual date and time at the beginning of the Chapter.

I thought of doing the following:

Chapter 3

October 31st 2008. 11:17 PM


What do you think? The idea of putting the date and time would be to give a greater appearance of realism, as if the story actually happened at one point in time. As I go back and forth in time through my novel, giving the date at the beginning of the chapter also makes it easier for the reader. I'm not sure if its a good idea, if its just cheap, or if I should just make the time clear in the writing. But I do go back thirty years between certain chapters.

Um... not sure what you are asking here.

If the date and time notations are important to the reader understanding your story, then I guess they need to be there. Put em in as you are writing. Then when you go back to edit, if they seem hokey or unneeded, take em out again.

They might be useful for you as you are writing just so you can keep your OWN place in the story. If the story is written cohesively, then you'll find as you edit that these markers may no longer be necessary.

I see no problems with this approach myself.

Depends on the book's ambiance.

Something in first person where the person actively keeps track of time for whatever reason is an obvious motive, maybe a 1984 or Brazil (a movie I hated) setting in third person would also justify it.

But if it doesn't make sense or if it's impossible to tell who actually checked the time to write it down, you're probably better off not.

Apart from a diary, putting the date down puts a lot of import on the events under it. Even more so when you do it by the minute. So it depends on the story.

I don't know if you've read Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby. It started chapters like this:

Saturday 27th April 1989
Leeds Utd vs Arsenal

The following chapter may or may not have little to do with football, but it punctuated the book nicely. There was a point to it - it helped show the MC's obsession with football in this way: His life was partly controlled by the fixture list.

If you don't have a good reason for it I'd suggest not doing it.

If you are using it to go back and forth thirty years as you say...don't. Make the time clear in your writing...

Hi, this is my first post here...

I've been fighting with something similar myself, One of my favorite authors, F. Paul Wilson doesn't do a specific year but the chapters are named after the days of the week that the events are happening, and I, with my urban fantasy that I've been writing have been thinking of doing the same thing. However, since my book starts on a Thursday on Halloween, I'm arbitrarily assigning it a certain year anyway by making it that specific. Which is why, myself I was thinking of doing a similar mechanic of like, Thursday, October 31, 2013 etc. It might be a bit crazy, at least in my circumstance to be constantly denote the time(after all it gets mentioned anyway in the chapter dialogue from time to time), but, if the time is important to the advancement of your story, Kind-of like a 24 thing, y'know with Kiefer Sutherland, where the audience NEEDS to know the time. Then go for it. Otherwise it might just be too much information that's unnecessary. For me, I'm thinking that my dates are getting mentioned anyway, people would figure it out, I don't really NEED to blatantly tell them outright when it is.

I used time stamps in writing. I don't see any issue with it whatsoever. Preference I suppose.

I'd say it's a style like any other, like starting each chapter with a haiku or adding illustrations. There's no style that can be wrong, it's just about one thing: Does it work for your story?