A story with different plot lines - called strands in Storybook - is thrilling because the author switches in a clever way between the strands. In our short story 3 strands are used:

• Amy's and Ben's strand. This strand is used for the first scene.

• Officer Kate's strand.

• The strand for the killer.

When starting a new project one strand is already defined called “Default Strand”. Right-click on that strand in the object tree and choose “Edit Strand”:

• You can also double click on a strand to open the edit dialog.

In the opened dialog, enter the new title “Amy & Ben” and the abbreviation “AmBe”. Close the dialog. Then right click again on the strand item in the tree and create 2 new strands:

• Title “Kate”, abbreviation “Kate”, color pink.

• Title “Killer”, abbreviation “Killer”, color dark gray.

For each strand there is a separate column now:

• The second scene plays in Kate's office, so it is part of Kate's strand. Click to the “+” button shown in Kate's strand for the same date as for the first scene.

• You don't have to hit the “+” button exactly. Click anywhere inside the box to add a new scene.

Here is the text for the second scene:

Kate's night turn.

Today it's Kate's night turn in the police office. Nothing exiting is happening. She checks her emails and gets a new one from an unknown sender. As she opens the mail and begins to read, she doesn't believe her eyes.

• Assign the character and location, too, as shown in the screen shot.

• The scene date is already filled in because we clicked inside the right “date row” for the new scene. Every time you click on a button inside a “date row”, the date is filled in for you.
   

The last scene for now is assigned to the strand for the killer and plays the next day on an unknown location.

The killer is taking a shower.

Even killers are dirty sometime. As the warm water runs over his body, he suddenly gets an idea. His next victim will be a police officer.

• This scene plays on the next day (Feb 3), so we have to click on the “date row” for Feb 3.

• We added a new location directly while editing the scene (with the button “new location”) and named it “Unknown”.

• The workspace looks now as shown above. We have two “date rows” and three “strand columns”.

Continue with Part 6