Tracking Character Arcs by node

The Character Evolution feature lets you track how a character changes across a long work. Not what happens to them — how they change because of what happens to them.

## What it does

For each character linked to your book, you can define evolution points — moments where the character shifts. These are tagged to specific locations in your text. Over the course of a novel, you build a visual timeline of who the character was at the beginning, who they are at each turning point, and who they become.

## Setting up evolution tracking

1. Open a character from the book dashboard 2. Go to the Evolution tab 3. Add evolution points: a label (what changed), a reference to the text (which chapter or section), and a brief note about the shift

Examples of evolution points: - "Marcus learns his father lied" (Chapter 4) — trust collapses - "Marcus helps a stranger despite his instincts" (Chapter 9) — empathy returns - "Marcus confronts his father" (Chapter 14) — resolution, but not forgiveness

## The timeline view

Once you've added evolution points, the character's Evolution tab shows a timeline. You can see the arc at a glance — where the character changes, how quickly, whether the changes accelerate or plateau.

This is useful for spotting problems:

- **Flat middle:** The character changes at the beginning and end but does nothing for eight chapters in between. The reader will feel this as stagnation. - **Sudden transformation:** The character jumps from state A to state B with no intermediate steps. This reads as implausible unless the triggering event is enormous. - **Regression without reason:** The character learns something in chapter five and forgets it in chapter ten. Sometimes this is intentional (people do backslide). Sometimes it's an oversight.

## When it's useful

Character evolution tracking is most useful for:

- **Novels with multiple POV characters.** When you're juggling three or four arcs, it's easy to lose track of where each character...