ContinuityFoundational
Timeline Integrity
The story's events fit a coherent calendar.
Principle
Time, once established, becomes binding.
Takeaways
- Track seasons, durations, and travel times.
- Implied timelines are still timelines.
- A small slip in time often produces a larger slip in meaning.
Overview
Timeline integrity is the consistency of the story's temporal scaffolding — how long events take, how long has passed between them, how seasons and ages line up. It is invisible when correct and corrosive when wrong.
Examples
- A pregnancy that lasts the wrong number of months.
- A journey that takes a week in one chapter and a day in the next.
- A character whose age does not square with their stated history.