Friday 8 May 2009

I just updated a ton of new code to the server because I simply could not wait to get this new feature released. Seriously, I feared that if I didn’t get this out of my system, I would spend all my time thinking about that instead of writing the next chapter.

So I hereby officially and somewhat prematurely announce the new section of the site: Storylines. (There is also now a link to it in the right sidebar on the main site.)

This is an idea/​request that has come up a few times around here. I wanted a way to link related chapters for easier reading — useful both for new people and long-​​time readers.

I also wanted to do a little user-​​interface experiment wherein I removed effectively everything from the page that did not directly have to do with reading the story and navigating within the storyline. (Still trying not to overwhelm new readers here.) So if you have any comments about that, I would like to hear that too.

Incidentally, if you love the new interface so much you desperately want to use it to read something that’s not on a storyline, that’s allowed too. At the bottom of a storyline chapter, just click the “next in story” instead of “next in storyline” and away you go. Or if you want to go to an arbitrary chapter but sneak it into the storyline reader, go to a URL like the following:

If you want to read:

http://​www​.lothere​.com/​c​h​a​p​t​er/17

go to:

http://​www​.lothere​.com/​s​t​o​r​y​l​i​n​e​/​1​/​c​h​a​p​t​er/17

I.e. just slip the “storyline/​1″ in there. (Storyline 1 is “Red Boots”.)

Either way I will probably make it possible to read using that minimalist design without forcing you to pretend it’s a storyline. And I will probably do a dark version too, to please myself. But one thing at a time.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand… I haven’t even finished putting in all the chapters for “Red Boots” yet, but I wanted to get this out the door so I could get your feedback. Hopefully it should be obvious how to use and navigate in this new section of the site, so if it’s not, it would be great if you could tell me what’s confusing you.

Also, as usual, I couldn’t resist rewriting a bunch of random crap that has nothing to do with storylines, so if something is broken that previously worked, raise your hand and let me know.

Oh! and of course! if you have any ideas for storylines that deserve to be featured, I would love to hear them. I plan on doing Ethelwyn + Mouse up to the towel-​​wearing scene, then probably Cat + Kiv, then I don’t know… The love story of Sigi and her Pig-​​dog? Cian and Eithne? The tragic tale of Lena’s year of freedom? How Britamund came to marry Dunstan? Ideas?

Have fun! :bunny: